Once the black armies marched in Catalonia.

A time when nobody could think. Folkloric and religious celebrations smashed, a fumbling of tasteless glass.

Bayonets gleamed in the half lit shadows of the internment camps.

We challenged the greed of those who made this affair
To teach our children what was true.

A momentary adjustment to the order of things.
And those who take your dreams to shape them to their own.

Now the past is remembered in Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona.

Fire songs in every town remind us that autumn is near,
and distant shots of rainfall wake the ghosts of those that bled for this soil.

We sing and march to warn the watching world that is entranced by Europe’s spell.

To walk free in the medieval winding lanes of Besalu, and drink with friends in the bars of Peratallada.