Athina Papadaki

Country House

With basil plants and pulses I 'll live,
folding my arms in cohesion
I ask that my circle close courteously.
The trees' roof lower
and the threhold an inch or so above
the silver driftwood on the strand.
At the turn of the skies around twilight
you forfeit authority
but gain chicory,
running water.
I go for an airing on the balcony.
Between door and horizon intervenes God.

Imitation
From Towards the Unknown, Kastaniotis 2005, p. 27. and republished in Ithaca Online

Uninvited he asked me for a rose.
The wish of a passer-by
I said to the rosebush, I’ll sacrifice you.
Meek the garden shimmered
in a profane world.
I tried to cut the aromatic plant,
it wouldn’t cut.
Why are you snipping the void
like a flower
said the passer-by.

Everything turned upside-down.
So for such a long time
what have I been watering, hoeing, irrigating?
The flowerbed a chimera,
or perhaps matter
took revenge on an imitation human?

Also,

Athina Papadaki, translated by Yannis Goumas and published in the Hellenic Quarterly:
The meal's trimmings, and, Country House.