Jewish Longing

Rabbi Yehuda Halevi, the medieval Spanish rabbi and greatest Hebrew poet of all time wrote:

My heart is in the east, and I in the uttermost west--

How can I find savour in food? How shall it be sweet to me?

How shall I render my vows and my bonds, while yet

Zion lieth beneath the fetter of Edom, and I in Arab chains?

A light thing would it seem to me to leave all the good things of Spain --

Seeing how precious in mine eyes to behold the dust of the desolate sanctuary.