The Sky Opened

Getting out of Madrid it was like the sky opened up, the earth opened up, to even more colors and flavors, if that was possible. One full day and in Seville and I'm glad I made it to the Real Alcazar, where the halls and the gardens got me tangled up in their beauty. For my tourist/explorer schtick, I'd thought initially that going to the Cathedral was enough. It was a lot: at Colombus's tomb I felt the power of that story like I never have, and walking up and down the Giralda was something else...the tower remaining from the mosque that was there before and offering lovely views of the city, but but but the tourists at the top were jammed in like sardines and the main narrative of how the Catholic bells triumphed over Islam felt too true...so glad a little voice in my head pushed me to the Alcazar, still an active palace--and, like in Toledo, a site first brought to prominence by the Visigoths and then to glory by the Ummayads--is something else, is other-worldly, almost felt like China, the looping narrative and paths impossible to follow, impossible not to savor; something deeper there rings true, something about looping paths, so many interpretations...