It was springtime.

The girl walked through the blossoming almond trees.

The heavy schoolbag on her back she did not feel.

Countless delicate pink petals covered the old, worn-out paving stones

on the path winding around the church.

A carpet of blossoms, a sea of blooms.

She did not take it in.

The spring wind blew the petals swirling from the trees.

On bright sunbeams they danced through the air like butterflies.

A dance of death – dying, just like the child.

Quietly the petals covered over the child’s soul, like broken-off butterfly wings.

A small, cramped hand opened hesitantly and stretched shyly towards

the falling blossoms.

A gentle breath of pink resurgent life laid itself delicately in the child’s

little hand and there it died.

Weeping blossoms.

Then it was over.

A dark cloud moved in front of the sun, the world turned grey.

Then the girl went to where she lived.

-Agnes Wich

Translation: Fr. Jim Corkery SJ.