Should I not behold your pity,
your unremitting, stern embrace,
heeled high from history’s tides so gritty,
to rule where serfdom bows in place.

Your mount is steep, its ground secure,
where timeless hills greet sky and sun.
A bride’s gown drapes the slopes demure,
not bathed in rice but golden spun.

The tower bells, they toll aloud,
tales of endurance echo clear.
Scarred by war, yet standing proud,
with not a mark, no sign of fear.

A river cleaves the land in twain,
soft as hills and valleys run.
Gentle as a maiden’s vein,
where Andalusian lands are one.

I marvel at the art so grand,
that floods your two great temples wide,
where prophets, saints in silence stand,
in stone from lands and hillsides plied.

My heart still falters at the sight
of noble crests and coats of arms;
those arches rule with guarded might,
their wealth in gold, yet cold of charms.

Today finds harmony in grace,
yet I can’t ignore the debt—
the lives beneath that golden trace,
spent in shadowed, endless sweat.