Kasia

Kasia

Sister Kasia died,
a nun and a poetess, like her famous namesake.
As a novice, she wore a black scarf over her head and worked in the
monastery garden.
She was a beekeeper too, the best one.
She talked to the bees and sang.
As a best novice, she was to take the dinner to the abbess.
It was a stormy night. The abbess was ill.
A noviciate took a pot of hot sage tea.
In secret, she took a piece of honeycomb full of honey and put it into
a cup.
She took a plate, knife, and one apple, every day abbess dinner.
A novice walked and sang down the corridor to the abbess room.
She was in a fever and lay with a smile.
A noviciate called her: Mother
Abbess told her to sing.
It was the last week of the lent.
Both were exhausted and hungry.
Novice sang and peeled the apple.
When she was younger, she competed with the other novices
who will take an apple to the abbess.
After they peeled the apple and gave it to the abbess,
noviciates snuk outside and secretly chewed the apple peel.
It was a time soon after the war when there was not enough food.
The noviciate gave a peeled apple to the abbess.
Here you are, Mother.
Abbess returned an apple to the novice and said: Eat it!
I will eat the apple peel to remind myself of its taste.
At the time the lent is over you will become a nun, said the abbess.
You will be tonsured and given a new name.
What do you think of the name Kasia?
That was years ago when Kasia was
born. Now Kasia lay in the coffin.
People came to the church to attend the liturgy before the funeral.
Kasia died alone in her monastic cell,
with a peeled apple on her nightstand.
Her eyes left opened like two deep water wells,
like two mirrors observing this world for the last time.