The Great Sea has set me
in motion
set me adrift
and I move as a weed in
the river.
The arch of sky
and mightiness of storms
encompasses me,
and I am left
trembling with joy.
Fray Luis de León, the great humanist scholar of the Spanish Golden Age, one of the sages of Salamanca University, was condemned by the Inquisition for translating the Song of Solomon and spent four years in prison before being allowed to return to his lectern, where he began his first lecture with the phrase, "Decíamos ayer": "As we were saying yesterday..."