Athina Papadaki was born in Athens. She studied political science and works as a journalist at a state organization. Her poems have been translated into many languages.

Athina Papadaki, Towards the Unknown, Kastaniotis 2005, p. 27.

IMITATION

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?