Henry Wadsworth Longfellow — Castles in Spain

How much of my young heart, O Spain,        &nbsp Went out to thee in days of yore! What dreams romantic filled my brain, And summoned back to life again The Paladins of Charlemagne        &nbsp The Cid Campeador! And shapes more shadowy than these,        &nbsp In the dim twilight half revealed; Phoenician galleys on the seas, The Roman camps like hives of bees, The Goth uplifting from his knees        &nbsp Pelayo on his shield. It was these memories perchance,        &nbsp From annals of remotest eld, That lent the colors of romance To every trivial circumstance, And changed the form and countenance        &nbsp Of all that I beheld. Old towns, whose history lies hid        &nbsp In monkish chronicle or rhyme, Burgos, the birthplace of the Cid, Zamora and Valladolid, Toledo, built and walled amid        &nbsp The wars of Wamba's time; The long, straight line of the high-way,        &nbsp The distant town that seems so near, The peasants in the fields, that stay Their toil to cross themselves and pray, When from the belfry at midday        &nbsp The Angelus they hear; White crosses in the mountain pass,        &nbsp Mules gay with tassels, the loud din Of muleteers, the tethered ass That crops the dusty wayside grass, And cavaliers with spurs of brass        &nbsp Alighting at the inn; White hamlets hidden in fields of wheat,        &nbsp White cities slumbering by the sea, White sunshine flooding square and street, Dark mountain-ranges, at whose feet The river-beds are dry with heat,—        &nbsp All was a dream to me. Yet something sombre and severe        &nbsp O'er the enchanted landscape reigned; A terror in the atmosphere As if King Philip listened near, Or Torquemada, the austere,        &nbsp His ghostly sway maintained. The softer Andalusian skies        &nbsp Dispelled the sadness and the gloom; There Cadiz by the seaside lies, And Seville's orange-orchards rise, Making the land a paradise        &nbsp Of beauty and of bloom. There Cordova is hidden among        &nbsp The palm, the olive, and the vine; Gem of the South, by poets sung, And in whose Mosque Ahmanzor hung As lamps the bells that once had rung        &nbsp At Compostella's shrine. But over all the rest supreme,        &nbsp The star of stars, the cynosure, The artist's and the poet's theme, The young man's vision, the old man's dream,— Granada by its winding stream,        &nbsp The city of the Moor! And there the Alhambra still recalls        &nbsp Aladdin's palace of delight; Allah il Allah! through its halls Whispers the fountain as it falls, The Darro darts beneath its walls,        &nbsp The hills with snow are white. Ah yes, the hills are white with snow,        &nbsp And cold with blasts that bite and freeze; But in the happy vale below The orange and pomegranate grow, And wafts of air toss to and fro        &nbsp The blossoming almond-trees. The Vega cleft by the Xenil,        &nbsp The fascination and allure Of the sweet landscape chains the will; The traveller lingers on the hill, His parted lips are breathing still        &nbsp The last sigh of the Moor. How like a ruin overgrown        &nbsp With flower's that hide the rents of time, Stands now the Past that I have known, Castles in Spain, not built of stone But of white summer clouds, and blown        &nbsp Into this little mist of rhyme!