Many blessings on Kassia: a bold and beautiful Byzantine poet

Intelligent, perceptive, creative:

And wise, so-wise with beautiful clear, blue eyes.

For, as you make clear in your verse, the false lust of adultery is a sin of man

Devised to ruin the goodness of woman

And it is a temptation that must accept the full springs of tears,

As you who bring the rain to wash us clean and fresh

Bow down to the sighs of my fluttered heart.

You altered our realm of being by your incomprehensible incarnation

And now the followers of a desert-seer dismiss your revelation

As less than nothing and want to kill all of those who proclaim you

As the risen Christ. Your wisdom sits plainly amongst the whores and robbers

Of port cities. Your beauty is a sunset reflected in the tired eyes

Of lovers who will not sell their soul no matter what the price.

I kiss your feet as if they were the feet of Eve last heard in Paradise

Your few devotees left here in what was Byzantium hide themselves away in fear

Of their sons being taken for Jannisaries.

Who can count the depth of your mercy or the height of the wisdom

Displayed in your judgement of tone and word

In your poetry. Only you, Kassia, only you, dearest heart.