Wake up, Sevilla
It’s the pre-sun morning
The 80 before the 90 degree calor
A worker crouches on a roof singing himself a folk song
voice already dry on hot air
I mumble a morning “buenos días”

Sevilla travels like a neighborhood in Brooklyn
it’s a biking, walking city
A dark-eyed tío in a Yankees baseball cap
“Hey, you ever been to Nueva York?”
“Maybe one day.”
You eye Sevilla and it eyes you
butt-hugging shorts in green, red, neon yellow
and a loose t-shirt: red, white, and blue America

No metal on metal skyscrapers
Orange buildings sit low down to the ground
Overseen by the Giralda
The bell-tower, the Moroccan beauty with Lady Faith
On her roundly layered perch, strong face, long arms, flowing cloth
And she reminds of another copper lady
Who stands in the Hudson River

She’ll do just fine, until I see the other again

—

Kayla Desroches is a senior at Barnard College in New York City and has lived in Brooklyn her whole life. She spent her spring semester abroad in Seville, Spain and discovered espressos, iberian ham (or jamón ibérico), and too many sights to name.