纳奇斯河。就在瀑布下方。
离任何小镇都是二十里。阳光
醇厚的一天，
带着浓稠的爱的香味。
我们呆了多久？
你的身体，毕加索的线条，
已在这高地的空气里渐渐干爽。
我用我的内衣
擦干你的背，你的臀。
时间是一头美洲狮。
没来由地我们就笑了，
当我触到你的胸，
便是地松鼠
也晕眩了。 我不会被她的电话招去
纵然她说我爱你，
哪怕，
即使她赌咒
并发誓
除了爱只有爱。 灯光在房间里
均匀摊盖住
所有东西；
连我的手臂也投不出阴影，
连它也随光而逝。 但爱这个字——
这个字在逐渐变暗，变得
沉重而摇摆不定
并开始侵蚀
这一页纸
你听。
I will not go when she calls
even if she says i love you,
especially that,
even though she swears
and promises nothing
But love love. The light in this room
covers every
thing equally;
my arm throws no shadow even,
it too is consumed with light. But this word love—
this word grows dark,grows
heavy and shake itself
and begins to eat
through this paper.
Listen. 几分钟前，我走到屋外的 露台上。从那里我可以看见和听见海水， 以及这些年发生在我身上的一切。 闷热而宁静。潮水退了。 没有鸟歌唱。当我靠着栅栏 一只蜘蛛网触到了我的前额。 它绊进我头发里了。没有人能责备我转身 走进屋子。没有风。大海 死一样沉寂。我把蜘蛛网挂在灯罩上。 当我的呼吸碰到它，我望着它不时地 颤动。一条精美的线。错综复杂。 不久之后，不等人们发现， 我就会从这里消失。
A few minutes ago, I stepped onto the deck of the house. From there I could see and hear the water, and everything that's happened to me all these years. It was hot and still. The tide was out. No birds sang. As I leaned against the railing a cobweb touched my forehead. It caught in my hair. No one can blame me that I turned and went inside. There was no wind. The sea was dead calm. I hung the cobweb from the lampshade. Where I watch it shudder now and then when my breath touches it. A fine thread. Intricate. Before long, before anyone realizes, I'll be gone from here. 现在是八月，六个月里 我没读一本书， 除了一册叫《从莫斯科撤退》的东西， 作者是柯内科。 但是，我很快乐， 和我兄弟驾着车， 喝了一品脱“老鸦”酒。 我们也没想着要去哪儿， 只是驾着车。 如果我闭上眼睛一小会儿， 我就会呜呼，但 我就能愉快地躺下来，永远地睡在 这条路边。 我兄弟用肘推了推我。 现在每一分钟，都可能有事情发生。
It's August and I have not Read a book in six months except something called The Retreat from Moscow by Caulaincourt Nevertheless, I am happy Riding in a car with my brother and drinking from a pint of Old Crow. We do not have any place in mind to go, we are just driving. If I closed my eyes for a minute I would be lost, yet I could gladly lie down and sleep forever beside this road My brother nudges me. Any minute now, something will happen. 十月。在这阴湿，陌生的厨房里
我端详父亲那张拘谨的年轻人的脸。
他腼腆地咧开嘴笑，一只手拎着一串
多刺的金鲈，另一只手
是一瓶嘉士伯啤酒。 穿着牛仔裤和粗棉布衬衫，他靠在
1934年的福特车的前挡泥板上。
他想给子孙摆出一副粗率而健壮的模样，
耳朵上歪着一顶旧帽子。
整整一生父亲都想要敢作敢为。 但眼睛出卖了他，还有他的手
松垮地拎着那串死鲈
和那瓶啤酒。父亲，我爱你，
但我怎么能说谢谢你？我也同样管不住我的酒，
甚至不知道到哪里去钓鱼。
October. Here in this dank, unfamiliar kitchen
I study my father's embarrassed young man's face.
Sheepish grin, he holds in one hand a string
of spiny yellow perch, in the other
a bottle of Carlsbad Beer. In jeans and denim shirt, he leans
against the front fender of a 1934 Ford.
He would like to pose bluff and hearty for his posterity,
Wear his old hat cocked over his ear.
All his life my father wanted to be bold. But the eyes give him away, and the hands
that limply offer the string of dead perch
and the bottle of beer. Father, I love you,
yet how can I say thank you, I who can't hold my liquor either,
and don't even know the places to fish? 写字时，他并没有望向大海， 他感觉他的笔尖开始颤抖。 潮水越过砂石向外涌去。 但不是这样。不， 那是因为那一刻她选择了 不着一丝衣衫走进房间。 倦眼昏昏，一瞬间，甚至不能肯定 她在哪里。她从前额捋了捋头发。 闭着眼坐在马桶上， 头低下。脚摊开。他从门口 看着她。也许 她还记着那天早上发生的事。 因为过了一会儿，她睁开一只眼望着他。 并且甜蜜地笑。
As he writes, without looking at the sea, he feels the tip of his pen begin to tremble. The tide is going out across the shingle. But it isn't that. No, it's because at that moment she chooses to walk into the room without any clothes on. Drowsy, not even sure where she is for a moment. She waves the hair from her forehead. Sits on the toilet with her eyes closed, head down. Legs sprawled. He sees her through the doorway. Maybe she's remembering what happened that morning. For after a time, she opens one eye and looks at him. And sweetly smiles. 几分钟她就从烤炉里给我 端出了一块饼。微微的蒸汽 从饼的裂缝向上升起。糖和香料—— 肉桂——烤进了馅饼皮。 但她戴着一副墨镜 在上午十点的 厨房里——一切正常—— 当她望着我切开 一块，放进嘴里， 食不知味。我女儿的厨房， 在冬天。我叉起一块饼， 告诉自己别管这事儿。 她说她爱他。再没有 比这更糟糕的了。
She serves me a piece of it a few minutes out of the oven. A little steam rises from the slits on top. Sugar and spice - cinnamon - burned into the crust. But she's wearing these dark glasses in the kitchen at ten o'clock in the morning - everything nice - as she watches me break off a piece, bring it to my mouth, and blow on it. My daughter's kitchen, in winter. I fork the pie in and tell myself to stay out of it. She says she loves him. No way Could it be worse. 这个早晨不同寻常。一点小雪 盖在地上。太阳浮在清澈的 蓝天里。海是蓝的，一片蓝绿， 远到视线所及。 几乎不起一丝涟漪。静谧。我穿上衣出门 散步——在接纳大自然必然的 馈赠之前不打算回来。 我走过一些苍老的，躬着身子的树。 穿过散落着堆积小雪的石头的 田野。一直走， 直到悬崖。 在那里，我凝望着大海，天空，以及 在低远处白色沙滩上盘旋的 海鸥。一切都很可爱。一切都沐浴在纯净的 清冷的光里。但是，和往常一样，我的思想 开始漫游。我不得不集中 精神去看那些我看着的东西 而不是别的什么。我不得不告诉自己这就是 紧要的事，而不是别的。（我确实看着它， 一两分钟之久！）有一两分钟 它从往常的关于是是非非的沉思中 挣扎出来——责任， 温柔的回忆，关于死亡的想法，以及我该如何对待 我的前妻。我希望 所有的事情这个早晨都会离开。 我每天都要忍受的事物。为了 继续活下去我所糟践的东西。 但是有一两分钟我真的忘记了 我自己以及别的一切。我知道我做到了。 因为当我转身返回我不知道 我在哪里。直到鸟儿从扭曲的树上 腾空飞起。飞翔在 我需要行进的方向。
This morning was something. A little snow lay on the ground. The sun floated in a clear blue sky. The sea was blue, and blue-green, as far as the eye could see. Scarcely a ripple. Calm. I dressed and went for a walk -- determined not to return until I took in what Nature had to offer. I passed close to some old, bent-over trees. Crossed a field strewn with rocks where snow had drifted. Kept going until I reached the bluff. Where I gazed at the sea, and the sky, and the gulls wheeling over the white beach far below. All lovely. All bathed in a pure cold light. But, as usual, my thoughts began to wander. I had to will myself to see what I was seeing and nothing else. I had to tell myself this is what mattered, not the other. (And I did see it, for a minute or two!) For a minute or two it crowded out the usual musings on what was right, and what was wrong -- duty, tender memories, thoughts of death, how I should treat with my former wife. All the things I hoped would go away this morning. The stuff I live with every day. What I've trampled on in order to stay alive. But for a minute or two I did forget myself and everything else. I know I did. For when I turned back i didn't know where I was. Until some birds rose up from the gnarled trees. And flew in the direction I needed to be going. 这么早外面几乎还是黑的。
我在窗边端着咖啡，
清早的平常事物
掠过我的头脑。
突然我看到一个男孩和他的同伴
沿路走过来
投递着报纸。
他们戴着帽子穿着毛衣，
其中一个肩上背着包。
他们是这么快乐，
什么话也没说，这些孩子。
我想如果能够，他们一定会
手挽着手。
这么早的早晨，
他们一块儿做这件事情。
他们走近了，慢慢地。
天空披上了曙光，
尽管月亮仍苍白地挂在水上。 这样的美，
死亡，雄心壮志，甚至爱，
都根本无法进入它。
快乐。它毫无预料地
来了。真的，它超越了 任何一个早晨。
So early it's still almost dark out.
I'm near the window with coffee,
and the usual early morning stuff
that passes for thought. When I see the boy and his friend
walking up the road
to deliver the newspaper. They wear caps and sweaters,
and one boy has a bag over his shoulder.
They are so happy
they aren't saying anything, these boys. I think if they could, they would take
each other's arm.
It's early in the morning,
and they are doing this thing together. They come on, slowly.
The sky is taking on light,
though the moon still hangs pale over the water. Such beauty that for a minute
death and ambition, even love,
doesn't enter into this. Happiness. It comes on
unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,
any early morning talk about it. 顺着窗子向下，在露台上，几只乱蓬蓬的
小鸟聚集在食槽边。相同的鸟儿，我想，
每天都来吃食，吵嚷。时间是，时间是，
它们叫着，相互挤撞。叫的几乎就是时间，是的。
天空整天阴暗，风从西边来，
不停地吹……把你的手伸给我一会儿。握在
我的手上。对了，就是这样。紧紧握住。时间就是我们
以为时间就在我们身边。时间是，时间是，
那些乱蓬蓬的鸟儿叫着。 他说看上去不太好 他说看上去很糟事实上真的很糟 他说在一边肺上我数到了三十二个然后 我就没再数了 我说我很高兴我不想知道 比那更多的情况了 他说你信教吗你会不会跪在 森林的小树丛里让自己祈求神助 当你来到一片瀑布 水雾吹拂在你的脸和手臂上 在那些时刻你会不会停下来祈求谅解 我说还没有但我打算从今天起开始 他说真的很遗憾他说 我真希望能有一些别的消息给你 我说阿门而他说了些别的什么 我没听懂也不知道该做些什么 我不想要他不得不又重复一次 也不想自己不得不将它全部消化 我只是望着他 望了一分钟他也回望着我就在那时 我跳起来和这个人握手是他刚刚给了我 这个世上别的人不曾给过我的东西 出于强大的习惯我甚至还要感谢他
He said it doesn't look good he said it looks bad in fact real bad he said I counted thirty-two of them on one lung before I quit counting them I said I'm glad I wouldn't want to know about any more being there than that he said are you a religious man do you kneel down in forest groves and let yourself ask for help when you come to a waterfall mist blowing against your face and arms do you stop and ask for understanding at those moments I said not yet but I intend to start today he said I'm real sorry he said I wish I had some other kind of news to give you I said Amen and he said something else I didn't catch and not knowing what else to do and not wanting him to have to repeat it and me to have to fully digest it I just looked at him for a minute and he looked back it was then I jumped up and shook hands with this man who'd just given me something no one else on earth had ever given me I may have even thanked him habit being so strong 这一生你得到了 你想要的吗，即使这样？ 我得到了。 那你想要过什么？ 叫我自己亲爱的，感觉自己 在这个世上被爱。
And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth. On the Columbia River near Vantage,
Washington, we fished for whitefish
in the winter months; my dad, Swede-
Mr. Lindgren-and me. They used belly-reels,
pencil-length sinkers, red, yellow, or brown
flies baited with maggots.
They wanted distance and went clear out there
to the edge of the riffle.
I fished near shore with a quill bobber and a cane pole. My dad kept his maggots alive and warm
under his lower lip. Mr. Lindgren didn't drink.
I liked him better than my dad for a time.
He lets me steer his car, teased me
about my name 'Junior,' and said
one day I'd grow into a fine man, remember
all this, and fish with my own son.
But my dad was right. I mean
he kept silent and looked into the river,
worked his tongue, like a thought, behind the bait. And all at length are gathered in.
--LOUISE BOGAN By the time I came around to feeling pain
and woke up, moonlight
flooded the room. My arm lay paralyzed,
propped up like an old anchor under
your back. You were in a dream,
you said later, where you'd arrived
early for the dance. But after
a moment's anxiety you were okay
because it was really a sidewalk
sale, and the shoes you were wearing,
or not wearing, were fine for that. "Help me," I said. And tried to hoist
my arm. But it just lay there, aching,
unable to rise on its own. Even after
you said, "What is it? What's wrong?"
it stayed put -- deaf, unmoved
by any expression of fear or amazement.
We shouted at it, and grew afraid
when it didn't answer. "It's gone to sleep,"
I said, and hearing those words
knew how absurd this was. But
I couldn't laugh. Somehow,
between the two of us, we managed
to raise it. This can't be my arm
is what I kept thinking as
we thumped it, squeezed it, and
prodded it back to life. Shook it
until that stinging went away. We said a few words to each other.
I don't remember what. Whatever
reassuring things people
who love each other say to each other
given the hour and such odd
circumstance. I do remember
you remarked how it was light
enough in the room that you could see
circles under my eyes.
You said I needed more regular sleep,
and I agreed. Each of us went
to the bathroom, and climbed back into bed
on our respective sides.
Pulled the covers up. "Good night,"
you said, for the second time that night.
And fell asleep. Maybe
into that same dream, or else another. I lay until daybreak, holding
both arms fast across my chest.
Working my fingers now and then.
While my thoughts kept circling
around and around, but always going back
where they'd started from.
That one inescapable fact: even while
we undertake this trip,
there's another, far more bizarre,
we still have to make. Fear of seeing a police car pull into the drive.
Fear of falling asleep at night.
Fear of not falling asleep.
Fear of the past rising up.
Fear of the present taking flight.
Fear of the telephone that rings in the dead of night.
Fear of electrical storms.
Fear of the cleaning woman who has a spot on her cheek!
Fear of dogs I've been told won't bite.
Fear of anxiety!
Fear of having to identify the body of a dead friend.
Fear of running out of money.
Fear of having too much, though people will not believe this.
Fear of psychological profiles.
Fear of being late and fear of arriving before anyone else.
Fear of my children's handwriting on envelopes.
Fear they'll die before I do, and I'll feel guilty.
Fear of having to live with my mother in her old age, and mine.
Fear of confusion.
Fear this day will end on an unhappy note.
Fear of waking up to find you gone.
Fear of not loving and fear of not loving enough.
Fear that what I love will prove lethal to those I love.
Fear of death.
Fear of living too long.
Fear of death. I've said that. They were in the living room. Saying their
goodbyes. Loss ringing in their ears.
They'd been through a lot together, but now
they couldn't go another step. Besides, for him
there was someone else. Tears were falling
when a horse stepped out of the fog
into the front yard. Then another, and
another. She went outside and said,
'Where did you come from, you sweet horses?'
and moved in amongst them, weeping,
touching their flanks. The horses began
to graze in the front yard.
He made two calls: one call went straight
to he sheriff - 'someone's horses are out.'
But there was that other call, too.
Then he joined his wife in the front
yard, where they talked and murmured
to the horses together. (Whatever was
happening now was happening in another time.)
Horses cropped the grass in the yard
that night. A red emergency light
flashed as a sedan crept in out of fog.
Voices carried out of the fog.
At the end of that long night,
when they finally put their arms around
each other, their embrace was full of
passion and memory. Each recalled
the other's youth. Now something had ended,
something else rushing in to take its place.
Came the moment of leave-taking itself.
'Goodbye, go on,' she said.
And then pulling away.
Much later,
he remembered making a disastrous phone call.
One that had hung on and hung on,
a malediction. It's boiled down
to that. The rest of his life.
Malediction. The people who were better than us were comfortable.
They lived in painted houses with flush toilets.
Drove cars whose year and make were recognizable.
The ones worse off were sorry and didn't work.
Their strange cars sat on blocks in dusty yards.
The years go by and everything and everyone gets replaced.
But this much is still true-I never liked work.
My goal was always to be shiftless.
I saw the merit in that.
I liked the idea of sitting in a chair in front of your house
for hours,
doing nothing but wearing a hat and drinking cola.
What's wrong with that?
Drawing on a cigarette from time to time.
Spitting.
Making things out of wood with a knife.
Where's the harm there?
Now and then calling the dogs to hunt rabbits.
Try it sometime. Once in a while hailing a fat, blond kid like me and saying,
'Don't I know you?'
Not, 'What are you going to be when you grow up?' It's what the kids nowadays call weed. And it drifts
like clouds from his lips. He hopes no one
comes along tonight, or calls to ask for help.
Help is what he's most short on tonight.
A storm thrashes outside. Heavy seas
with gale winds from the west. The table he sits at
is, say, two cubits long and one wide.
The darkness in the room teems with insight.
Could be he'll write an adventure novel. Or else
a children's story. A play for two female characters,
one of whom is blind. Cutthroat should be coming
into the river. One thing he'll do is learn
to tie his own flies. Maybe he should give
more money to each of his surviving
family members. The ones who already expect a little
something in the mail first of each month.
Every time they write they tell him
they're coming up short. He counts heads on his fingers
and finds they're all survivng. So what
if he'd rather be remembered in the dreams of strangers?
He raises his eyes to the skylights where rain
hammers on. After a while --
who knows how long? -- his eyes ask
that they be closed. And he closes them.
But the rain keeps hammering. Is this a cloudburst?
Should he do something? Secure the house
in some way? Uncle Bo stayed married to Aunt Ruby for 47 years. Then hanged himself.
He opens his eyes again. Nothing adds up.
It all adds up. How long will this storm go on? Cool summer nights.
Windows open.
Lamps burning.
Fruit in the bowl.
And your head on my shoulder.
These the happiest moments in the day. Next to the early morning hours,
of course. And the time
just before lunch.
And the afternoon, and
early evening hours.
But I do love these summer nights.
Even more, I think,
than those other times.
The work finished for the day.
And no one who can reach us now.
Or ever. These fish have no eyes
these silver fish that come to me in dreams,
scattering their roe and milt
in the pockets of my brain. But there's one that comes-
heavy, scarred, silent like the rest,
that simply holds against the current, closing its dark mouth against
the current, closing and opening
as it holds to the current. I woke up with a spot of blood
over my eye. A scratch
halfway across my forehead.
But I'm sleeping alone these days.
Why on earth would a man raise his hand
against himself, even in sleep?
It's this and similar questions
I'm trying to answer this morning.
As I study my face in the window. it gets run over by a van.
you find it at the side of the road
and bury it.
you feel bad about it.
you feel bad personally,
but you feel bad for your daughter
because it was her pet,
and she loved it so.
she used to croon to it
and let it sleep in her bed.
you write a poem about it.
you call it a poem for your daughter,
about the dog getting run over by a van
and how you looked after it,
took it out into the woods
and buried it deep, deep,
and that poem turns out so good
you're almost glad the little dog
was run over, or else you'd never
have written that good poem.
then you sit down to write
a poem about writing a poem
about the death of that dog,
but while you're writing you
hear a woman scream
your name, your first name,
both syllables,
and your heart stops.
after a minute, you continue writing.
she screams again.
you wonder how long this can go on. |
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