Oureana, Queen of Granada,
Looks from her Moorish palace veranda,
Reclined in a den of lavish repose,
Sipping sweet milk from a porcelain bowl.
Draped in damask and easter green,
She watches the soldier ride below.
“Resist your whim, don’t look at him!”
Softly comes the desperate hum
Of a servant forgot and ignored.
“For you, this sin evokes the din
Of sieging torrents, wind and war…
I wish, my friend, you’d hear again
The crack of battle nevermore.”
I reworked this poem from last year.