WHERE THE BREATH IS

She stands alone onstage
and has no instrument.

She lays her palms upon her breast,
where the breath is born
and where it dies.

The palms do not sing
nor does the breast.

What sings is what stays silent.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

呼吸所在

她獨自站在臺上
不帶一件樂器。

她把兩隻手掌放在胸口，
呼吸從那裏誕生
從那裏消亡。

手掌並不歌唱，
胸口也不。

那歌唱的始終保持沉默。

翻譯 © 史春波

IMPOSSIBLE

5414 S. Blackstone, Chicago

It’s so hard, trying to write, be it
at home, on a plane above the ocean,
over a black forest, in the evening stillness.
Always starting afresh, reaching
full speed and fifteen minutes later
giving up, in reluctant surrender.
I hope that you at least can hear me,
—since, as you know, the theoreticians remind us
insistently, almost daily, that we’ve missed
the point, as usual we’ve skipped
the deeper meaning, we’ve been reading
the wrong books, alas,
we’ve drawn the wrong conclusions.
They claim poetry is fundamentally impossible,
a poem is a hall where faces dissolve
in a golden haze of spotlights, where the fierce
rumblings of an angry mob drown out
defenseless single voices.
So what then? Fine words perish quickly,
ordinary words rarely persuade.
All the evidence suggests silentium
claims only a handful of adherents.
Sometimes I envy the dead poets,
they no longer have “bad days,” they don’t know
“ennui,” they’ve parted ways with “vacancy,”
“rhetoric,” rain, low-pressure zones,
they’ve stopped following the “shrewd reviews,”
but they keep speaking to us.
Their doubts vanished with them,
their rapture lives.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

不可能

芝加哥黑石大道南5414號

真困難，試圖寫作，不管是
在家中，還是在俯瞰海洋、橫越
一片黑森林的飛機上，在黃昏的寧靜中。
總是開始時新鮮，達到
全速，但十五分鐘後
就放棄，不情願地投降。
我希望至少你可以聽見我，
──因為，如你所知，理論家們一而再地，
幾乎是天天提醒我們，說我們
搞錯了，一如往常我們沒領會
更深刻的意義，我們一直
讀錯書，唉，
我們下錯結論。
他們宣稱：詩歌在根本上是不可能的，
一首詩是一個大堂，那兒眾多面孔消融
在聚光燈的金色迷霧裏，那兒一群
憤怒的烏合之眾猛烈的抱怨聲淹沒
一個個無助的單獨聲音。
那又怎樣呢？美好詞語快速消失，
普通詞語很難服人。
所有證據表明沉默
只能擁有幾個追隨者。
有時候我羨慕死去的詩人，
他們不再有「壞日子」，他們不知道
「厭煩」，他們已離開「空虛」、
「雄辯」、雨、低氣壓地帶，
他們已停止看「尖銳的評論」，
但他們繼續跟我們說話。
他們的懷疑隨他們消失，
他們的狂喜活著。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

PIANO LESSON

I’m eight years old

Piano lesson at the neighbors’, Mr. and Mrs. J.
I’m in their apartment for the first time,
which smells different from ours (ours has no smell,
or so I think). Everywhere carpets,
thick Persian carpets. I know that they’re Armenians,
but don’t know what that means. Armenians have carpets,

dust wanders through the air, imported
from Lvov, medieval dust.
We don’t have carpets or Middle Ages.
We don’t know who we are—maybe wanderers.
Sometimes I think we don’t exist. Only others are.
The acoustics are great in our neighbors’ apartment.

It’s quiet in this apartment. A piano stands in the room
like a lazy, tamed predator—and in it,
at its very heart, dwells music’s black ball.
Mrs. J told me right after the first
or second lesson that I should take up languages
since I showed no talent for music.

I show no talent for music.
I should take up languages instead.
Music will always be elsewhere,
inacessible, in someone else’s apartment.
The black ball will be hidden elsewhere,
but there may be other meetings, revelations.

I went home, hanging my head,
a little saddened, a little glad—home,
where there was no smell of Persia, only amateur paintings,
watercolors, and I thought with bitterness and pleasure
that I had only language, only words, images,
only the world.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

鋼琴課

那年我八歲

在鄰居家上鋼琴課，跟J先生和J太太。
我第一次去他家公寓，
那味道與我家裏不同（我們家沒有味道，
起碼我這樣認為）。到處鋪著地毯，
厚厚的波斯地毯。我知道他們是亞美尼亞人，
但並不懂其中含義。亞美尼亞人擁有地毯，

空氣中灰塵彌漫，那是從利沃夫
進口來的，中世紀的灰塵。
我們沒有地毯，沒有中世紀。
我們不知道自己是誰——也許是漫遊者。
有時我想，我們並不存在。只有他人存在。
鄰居家的音效好極了。

公寓裏十分安靜。鋼琴立在屋中
像一隻懶洋洋被馴服的野獸——在它的內裏，
最中心的地方，棲居著音樂的黑球。
剛上過一兩堂課，J太太就告訴我
我還是去學語言為好
因為我沒有音樂天賦。

我沒有音樂天賦。
我應當去學語言。
音樂將永遠在別處，
望塵莫及，在別人家裏。
黑球將永遠藏在別處，
但可能有另外的相遇和啟發。

我回到家中，垂著腦袋，
有點難過，有點高興——家，
這裏沒有波斯味道，惟有業餘的油畫，
水彩畫，我心懷苦澀和愉悅
想到我擁有的惟有語言，詞語，意象，
惟有這世界。

翻譯 © 史春波

SWIFTS STORMING ST. CATHERINE’S CHURCH

Watching the swifts storm St. Catherine’s Church,
its lofty walls raised of brick and white stone
—an unfinished basilica, earthquakes
and fires beset it, the transept
and tower were never built—I thought:
the swifts in their mad, haphazard, grand
attack on the Gothic structure and in their whistles,
shrill and coarse, utterly un-human,
competing with cell ringtones
and singing blackbirds, giving their final concert,
are the image of ecstasy, but not ecstasy itself,
they can’t be, they don’t want to be—
they aren’t John of the Cross or Catherine of Alexandria
or Catherine of Siena, they know neither fullness nor void,
doubt and pursuit, despair and rapture.
These swifts are of the species Apus apus,
they resemble swallows but share
no kinship, they’re unable
to navigate on land, they know only one thing—flight,
only the endless soaring overhead
that demands a spectator both slightly sober
and a little touched, they need an eye and a heart;
the eye must trace the trajectories of dark missiles,
the trail of a spaceship smashed
into tiny shards of dark nervous matter,
and the heart must sustain them with what it cannot
lack, enthusiasm, and thus fortified,
the swifts and the observer’s heart join for a brief moment
in an unlikely contract, in admiration
for a world that has decided on a late June evening,
so it seems, to reveal before us, nonchalantly,
one of its zealously kept secrets
before night returns, mosquitoes and ignorance,,
and my life, unfinished, uncertain,
made of joy and fear, of ceaseless,
unsated curiosity, what’s coming next;
but now the day’s shutters bang closed
(and I’ve already said too much).

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

雨燕沖擊聖凱瑟琳教堂

望著雨燕沖擊聖凱瑟琳教堂，
它高聳的墻用磚和白石砌起
──一座未完成的教堂，地震
和火災侵擾它，耳堂
和塔樓從未建造──我想：
雨燕一邊以牠們的瘋狂、混亂、雄偉
對這座哥特式結構发動襲擊，一邊以牠們
絕對地非人性的呼嘯、尖叫和粗魯
與手機鈴聲和舉辦
最後音樂會的歌唱的黑鳥競爭，
乃是狂喜的形象，但不是狂喜本身，
牠們不可能狂喜，牠們不想狂喜──
牠們不是十字架的聖約翰或亞歷山大的凱瑟琳
或錫耶納的凱瑟琳，牠們不知道充實或虛空，
懷疑或追求，絕望或歡欣。
這些雨燕屬於普通雨燕種，
牠們類似燕子但沒有
親緣關系，牠們無法
橫越大地，牠們只知道一件事──飛啊飛，
只知道無窮盡地向頭頂上升騰，
要求觀看者帶著一點嚴肅
和一點兒受感動，牠們需要一隻眼睛和一顆心；
眼睛必須追蹤黑暗導彈的軌道，
太空船粉碎成一片片
神經兮兮的黑暗物質碎屑的蹤跡，
而心一定要用它不可缺少的東西維持它們，
那就是熱情，從而得到加強，
雨燕和觀看者的心有那麽一瞬間聯系起來，
在一個不大可能的契約中，在對世界的
讚嘆中，而世界似乎已在一個六月底的黃昏
決定若無其事地向我們披露
其狂熱地保守的秘密之一，
就在黑夜帶著蚊子和無知，
帶著我這未完成、不確定
有歡樂和憂懼、有難以遏止、
難以滿足的好奇心和未知數的生命重返之前；
但現在白天的百葉窗砰地關上
（而我已經說得太多）。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

WAS IT

Was it worth waiting in consulates
for some clerk’s fleeting good humor
and waiting at the station for a late train,
seeing Etna in its Japanese cloak
and Paris at dawn, as Haussman’s conventional caryatids
came looming from the dark,
entering cheap restaurants
to the triumphal smell of garlic,
was it worth taking the underground
beneath I can’t recall what city
to see the shades of not my ancestors,
flying in a tiny plane over an earthquake
in Seattle like a dragonfly above a fire, but also
scarcely breathing for three months, asking anxious questions,
forgetting the mysterious ways of grace,
reading in papers about betrayal, murder,
was it worth thinking, remembering, falling
into deepest sleep, where gray hallways
stretched, buying black books,
jotting only separate images
from a kaleidoscope more glorious than the cathedral
in Seville, which I haven’t seen,
was it worth coming and going, was it—
yes no yes no
erase nothing.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

是否

是否值得在領事館等待
某個職員一閃即逝的好脾氣
和在火車站等待晚班車，
值得看披著日本斗篷的埃特納火山
和拂曉的巴黎，當奧斯曼那些傳統手法的女像柱
從黑暗中迎面聳立，
值得進入廉價餐館
去聞那喜氣洋洋的大蒜味，
值得搭乘我想不起是
什麽城市下的地鐵
去看不是我的祖先的幽靈，
值得坐小型飛機盤旋在西雅圖
一次地震上猶如蜻蜓在火堆上，卻又
幾乎三個月不能呼吸，提些焦慮的問題，
忘記恩典的神秘方式，
在報紙上讀背叛和謀殺的故事，
是否值得思考、回憶、陷入
最深的沉睡，沉睡中灰色的門廳
伸展，值得購買黑書，
匆匆從一個比我未見過的塞維利亞的大教堂
還輝煌的萬花筒裏
記下零散的影像，
是否值得來來去去，是否——
是也好不是也好
都抹不掉什麽。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

IT WAS A HOLIDAY

It was a holiday, but we turned away from the holiday.
Books lay on the table, we didn’t read them now.
In the distance was the great world, a world of love and betrayal,
unknown, unnamed, always, still completely new.
Those whom we’d known since childhood walked beside us
in silence, some vanished abruptly,
with a brief cry of fear—
like swallows, who are always frantic.
We were tired, but no one complained.
Nights were short, the dawns were transparent,
at evening orioles wept in the woods,
but we knew the streets and parks better.
We wandered slowly, looking carefully around us,
noting words in our memory—we thought:
we’ll have to write them down later.
We held hands, wading through the sand
of abandoned suburbs. Heavy trains
passed before us in the distance,
the ocean roared, and darkness.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

那個假日

那個假日，我們把臉轉向別處。
書放在桌上，我們無心閱讀。
遠處是偉大的世界，愛與背叛的世界，
不為人知，沒有命名。永恒，常新。
孩童時代的朋友與我們並肩行走
保持沉默，有些人突然消失，
帶一聲驚恐的尖叫——
像燕子，總是那樣惶惑。
我們十分疲憊，但沒有人抱怨。
夜晚短暫，拂曉透明，
傍晚時，黃鸝在樹林裏哭泣，
而我們對街道和公園更熟悉了。
我們不緊不慢地遊蕩，謹慎觀察四周，
記憶中沒有詞語——我們想：
這些應當在事後寫下。
我們拉著手，蹚過沙子
在廢棄的郊外。火車轟響
從前方遠處經過，
大海在咆哮，接著是黑暗。

翻譯 © 史春波

WALK THROUGH THIS TOWN

Walk through this town at a gray hour
when sorrow hides in shady gates
and children play with great balls
that float like kites above
the poisoned wells of courtyards,
and, quiet, doubting, the last blackbird sings.

Think about your life which goes on,
though it’s already lasted so long.

Could you voice the smallest fragment of the whole.

Could you name baseness when you saw it.

If you met someone truly living
would you know it?

Did you abuse high words?

Whom should you have been, who knows.
You love silence, and you’ve mastered
only silence, listening to words, music, and quiet:
why did you begin to speak, who knows.

Why in this age, why in a country
that wasn’t born yet, who knows.
Why among exiles, in a flat that had been
German, amid grief and mourning
and vain hopes of a regained myth.

Why a childhood shadowed
by mining towers and not a forest’s dark,
near a stream where a quiet dragonfly keeps watch
over the world’s secret wholeness

—who knows.

And your love, which you lost and found,
and your God, who won’t help those
who seek him,
and hides among theologians
with degrees.

Why just this town at a gray hour,
this dry tongue, these numb lips,
and so many questions before you leave
and go home to the kingdom
from which silence, rapture, and the wind
once came.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

穿行於這座城鎮

在一個昏暗時刻穿行於這座城鎮
當憂傷隱藏在陰沉的大門裏
而兒童玩著風箏般飄蕩
在庭院有毒水井上空的大球，
而安寧、帶懷疑的最後黑鳥歌唱。

想想你那繼續著的生活，
儘管它已維持太久了。

你能否表達整體中最小碎片的聲音。

你能否在見到卑鄙時直呼其名。

如果你遇見某個真正生活著的人
你會知道嗎？

你是否濫用華麗的辭藻？

你原可以成為什麽樣的人，誰知道。
你愛沉默，而你只精通
沉默，傾聽文字、音樂，而且安靜：
為什麽你開始說話，誰知道。

為什麽在這個年代，在一個
還未誕生的國家，誰知道。
為什麽躋身於流亡者中間，在一套曾經是德國人的
公寓，周圍是悲傷和哀痛
和徒勞想重獲一個神話的希望。

為什麽童年蒙上采礦架
而不是森林的黑暗的陰影，
在一條溪流邊，那裏一隻安靜的蜻蜓繼續看守
世界的秘密整體

──誰知道。

還有你的愛，它失而復得；
還有你的神，祂不幫助那些
尋找祂的人，
並躲在擁有學位的
神學家中間。

為什麽只是這座昏暗時刻的城鎮，
這乾燥的舌頭，這麻痹的嘴唇，
和如此多的問題，在你離開
回你的王國之前，那王國
曾經是沉默、狂喜和風的
发源地。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

BUTTERFLIES

It’s a December night, the century’s end, dark and calm,
     draws near.
I slowly read friends’ poems, look at photographs,
     the spines of books.
Where has C. gone? What’s become of bumptious K. and smiling T.?
     What ever happened to B. and N.?
Some have been dead a millenium, while others, debutants, died
     just the other month.
Are they together? In a desert with a crimson dawn?
     We don’t know where they live.
By a mountain stream where butterflies play?
     In a town scented with mignonette?
Die Toten reiten schnell, S. repeated eagerly (he too
     is gone).
They ride little horses in the steppe’s quiet, beneath a round yellow
     cloud.
Maybe they steal coal at a little railroad stop in Asia and melt
     snow in sooty pots
like those transported in freight cars.
     (Do they have camps and barbed wire?)
Do they play checkers? Listen to music? Do they see Christ?
     They dictate poems to the living.
They paint bison on cave walls, begin building
     the cathedral in Beauvais.
Have they grasped the sense of evil, which eludes us,
     and forgiven those who persecuted them?
They wade through an arctic glacier, soft from the August heat.
     Do they weep? Regret?
Talk on telephones for hours? Hold their tongues? Are they here among us?
     Nowhere?
I read poems, listen to the mighty whisper
     of night and blood.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

蝴蝶

那是一個十二月的夜晚，世紀那黑暗而平靜的盡頭
    已臨近。
我慢慢閱讀朋友們的詩，看照片，
    書脊。
C哪裏去了？狂妄的K怎樣了，還有微笑的T？
    B和N近況如何？
有些已死了一千年，另一些，首次登臺者，剛於
    前幾個月去世。
他們在一起嗎？在有緋紅色黎明的沙漠裏？
    我們不知道他們住在哪裏。
在有蝴蝶嬉戲的山溪邊？
    在散发木犀草味的小鎮？
死人騎得快，S曾熱切地重複（他也已經
    走了）。
他們在草原的安靜中，在一團黃色圓雲下騎著
    小馬。
也許他們在亞洲一個火車小站偷煤，在滿是煤煙的罐子裏
    融雪
如同那些被用車皮運送的人。
    （他們有集中營和鐵絲網嗎？）
他們下棋嗎？聽音樂嗎？他們看到基督嗎？
    他們向生者口授詩歌。
他們在洞穴墻上畫野牛，開始在博韋
    建造大教堂。
他們抓住那回避我們的罪惡感，
    並原諒那些迫害他們的人嗎？
他們涉過一條在八月酷烈下回軟的北極冰河。
    他們流淚嗎？後悔嗎？
講幾個小時電話？一言不发？他們在這兒，在我們中間嗎？
    不在任何地方？
我讀詩，傾聽夜與血的
    強大低語。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

譯注：博韋，法國地名。

SUNRISE OVER CASSIS

In the semi-darkness white buildings loom, not fully
formulated, and beside them, the gray vineyards, the quiet before dawn;
Judas counts his silver coins, but olive trees contorted
in wild prayer enter the earth ever more deeply.
Where is the sun! But it’s still cold
and a humble landscape spreads around us;
the stars have gone and priests sleep tight, birds aren’t allowed
to sing in August and only now and then one
stammers like a lazy boy in high school Latin.
It’s four a.m. and despair lives in so many houses.
This is the time when sad philospohers with narrow faces
compose their jaded aphorisms and worn conductors,
who’d brought Bruckner and Mahler back to life that evening,
drift off to sleep unwilling, unapplauded, and whores go home
to their shabby apartments.
                                          We ask that the vineyards,
gray as if coated with volcanic ash, be given life,
and that the great, distant cities awaken from their apathy,
and I ask not to confuse freedom with chaos
and to regain the faith that unites
things seen and sunseen, but doesn’t lull the heart.
Beneath us the sea turns blue and the horizon’s line
grows ever finer, like a slender fillet
that embraces, lovingly and firmly, our turning planet,
and we see fishing boats rock trustfully like gulls
upon the deep, blue waters and a moment later
the sun’s crimson disc emerges from a half circle of hills
and returns the gift of light.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

卡西斯的日出

在半暗中白色建築群聳立，還未完全
成形，而建築群旁，那灰沉沉的葡萄園，那黎明前的寧靜；
猶大算著銀幣，但在猛烈祈禱中
扭彎的橄欖樹比任何時候都更深入大地。
太陽在哪裏！現在依然寒冷，
一片謙卑的風景在我們周圍鋪展；
星星已離去，牧師們睡得正沉，鳥兒在八月
不許歌唱，偶爾才有一隻
結結巴巴，像中學拉丁課上不用功的男生。
現在是淩晨四點，絕望住在如此多的房子裏。
這時候臉孔狹長的憂傷哲學家
正雕琢他們陳舊的格言，而疲乏的指揮家，
他們昨晚剛使布魯克納和馬勒復活，
此刻無人鼓掌地、不大情願地迷糊入睡，而妓女們
回到她們寒酸的公寓裏。
                                         我們懇求葡萄園
被賦予生命，它們灰沉沉，像塗上一層火山灰；
懇求遠方那些大城市從冷漠中蘇醒，
而我懇求別誤將自由等同於混亂，
懇求重獲那樣一種信仰，它連接
可見和不可見的事物，但不鈍化心靈。
在我們下面大海變藍，地平線的輪廓
逐漸清晰，像一條細長的帶子
深情而牢牢地環抱我們這轉動中的星球，
我們看見漁船可靠地搖晃，像海鷗
在深藍色的水面上，而不一會兒
太陽深紅色的圓盤從圍成半圈的群山裏浮現，
歸還光的禮物。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

譯注：卡西斯是法國著名渡假勝地。

THREE VOICES

The cloud of dusk gathers in the room.
The shadows of night are growing, tamed desire.
On the radio, Mahler’s Song of the Earth.
Outside the window, blackbirds whistle, carefree and loud.
And I can hear the soft rustling
of my blood (as if snow were sliding down the mountains).
These three voices, these three alien voices,
are speaking to me but they don’t
demand anything, they make no promise.
In the background, somewhere
in the meadow, the cortege of night,
full of hollow whispers, forms
and re-forms, trying to get in order.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

三種聲音

黃昏的雲在房間裏攏集。
夜的影子在增長，馴服的欲望。
收音機裏，馬勒的《大地之歌》。
窗外，黑鳥囀鳴，無牽掛而喧囂。
而我聽見我的血液
輕柔的瑟瑟響（彷彿雪正從山邊滑落）。
這三種聲音，這三種陌生的聲音，
正在跟我講話但它們不提出
要求，它們不作出承諾。
在背景中，在草地
某處，夜的送葬隊伍
充滿空洞的低語，形成
再形成，試圖整頓秩序。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

MOMENT

In the Romanesque church round stones
that ground down so many prayers and generations
kept humble silence and shadows slept in the apse
like bats in winter furs.

We went out. The pale sun shone,
tinny music tinkled softly
from a car, two jays
studied us, humans,
threads of longing dangled in the air.

The present moment is shameless,
taking its foolish liberties
beside the wall
of this tired old shrine,

awaiting the millions of years to come,
future wars, geological eras,
cease-fires, treaties, changes in climate—
this moment—what is it—just

a mosquito, a fly, a speck, a scrap of breath,
and yet it’s taken over everywhere,
entering the timid grass,
inhabiting stems and genes,
the pupils of our eyes.

This moment, mortal as you or I.
was full of boundless, senseless,
silly joy, as if it knew
something we didn’t.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

時刻

使如此多祈禱者和世代耗盡體力的
羅馬式教堂裏的圓形石頭
繼續讓謙卑的寂靜和陰影沉睡在半圓形小室裏
如同冬天裏裹著裘皮的蝙蝠。

我們走出來。蒼白的太陽照耀，
微小的音樂輕柔地
從一輛汽車裏丁丁傳來，兩隻松鴉
研究我們──人類，
渴望的絲線在空氣中晃蕩。

當下這個時刻不知羞恥，
在這座疲憊而古老的
聖所墻邊
愚蠢地冒險，

等待幾百萬年抵達，
還有未來戰爭、地理年代、
停火、條約、氣候變化──
這個時刻──它是什麽──只是

一隻蚊子，一隻蒼蠅，一個斑點，一縷呼吸，
然而它到處接管，
進入膽怯的青草，
占據葉莖和基因，
我們眼睛裏的瞳孔。

這個如同你我一樣會死的時刻
充滿無邊、無意義、
傻乎乎的歡樂，彷彿它知道些
我們不知道的事情。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

BLACKBIRD

A blackbird sat on the TV antenna
and sang a gentle, jazzy tune.
Whom have you lost, I asked, what do you mourn?
I’m taking leave of those who’ve gone, the blackbird said,
I’m parting with the day (its eyes and lashes),
I mourn a girl who lived in Thrace,
you wouldn’t know her.
I’m sorry for the willow, killed by frost.
I weep, since all things pass and alter
and return, but always in a different form.
My narrow throat can barely hold
the grief, despair, delight, and pride
occasioned by such sweeping transformations.
A funeral cortege passes up ahead,
the same each evening, there, on the horizon’s thread.
Everyone’s there, I see them all and bid farewell.
I see the swords, hats, kerchiefs, and bare feet,
guns, blood, and ink. They walk slowly
and vanish in the river mist, on the right bank.
I say goodbye to them and you and the light,
and then I greet the night, since I serve her—
and black silks, black powers.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

黑鳥

一隻黑鳥棲息在電視天線上，
唱著溫柔、爵士樂般的曲子。
你失去誰，我問，你哀悼什麽？
我在告別那些去世的人，黑鳥說，
我在告別這一天（它的眼和睫），
我哀悼一個住在色雷斯的女孩，
你不會認識她。
我為那株凍死的柳樹感到難過。
我流淚，因為一切事物消逝、改變
又重返，但永遠以另一種方式。
我狹窄的喉嚨幾乎承受不了
這些急速轉變所帶來的
悲傷、絕望、愉悅和驕傲。
一個送葬行列從前面經過，
每個黃昏都是如此，在那兒，在地平線上。
每個人都在那兒，我看見他們並說再見。
我看見劍、帽、頭巾和赤腳，
槍、血和墨水。他們慢慢地走，
消失在河流的霧靄裏，在右岸上。
我告別他們和你和光，
然後迎接黑夜，因為我服侍她——
還有黑絲綢、黑力量。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

THREE ANGELS

Suddenly three angels appeared
right here by the bakery on St. George Street.
Not another census bureau survey,
one tired man sighed.
No, the first angel said patiently,
we just wanted to see
what your lives have become,
the flavor of your days and why
your nights are marked by restlessness and fear.

That’s right, fear, a lovely, dreamy-eyed
woman replied; but I know why.
The labors of the human mind have faltered.
They seek help and support
they can’t find. Sir, just take a look
—she called the angel “Sir”!—
at Wittgenstein. Our sages
and leaders are melancholic madmen
and know even less than us
ordinary people (but she wasn’t
ordinary).

              Then too, said one boy
who was learning to play the violin, evenings
are just an empty carton,
a casket minus mysteries,
while at dawn the cosmos seems as
parched and foreign as a TV screen.
And besides, those who love music for itself
are few and far between.

Others spoke up and their laments
surged into a swelling sonata of wrath.
If you gentlemen want to know the truth,
one tall student yelled—he’d
just lost his mother—we’ve had enough
of death and cruelty, persecution, disease,
and long spells of boredom still
as a serpent’s eye. We’ve got too little earth
and too much fire. We don’t know who we are.
We’re lost in the forest, and black stars
move lazily above us as if
they were only our dream.

But still, the second angel mumbled shyly,
there’s always a little joy, and even beauty
lies close at hand, beneath the bark
of every hour, in the quiet heart of concentration,
and another person hides in each of us—
universal, strong, invincible.
Wild roses sometimes hold the scent
of childhood, and on holidays young girls
go out walking just as they always have,
and there’s something timeless
in the way they wind their scarves.
Memory lives in the ocean, in galloping blood,
in black, burnt stones, in poems,
and in every quiet conversation.
The world is the same as it always was,
full of shadows and anticipation.

He would have gone on talking, but the crowd
was growing larger and waves
of mute rage spread
until at last the envoys rose lightly
into the air, whence, growing distant,
they gently repeated: peace be unto you,
peace to the living, the dead, the unborn.
The third angel alone said nothing,
for that was the angel of long silence.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

三個天使

三個天使突然出現
在這裏，在聖喬治街這家面包店旁。
不是又來做人口普查吧，
一個疲倦的男人嘆息道。
不是的，第一個天使耐心地說，
我們只是想看看
你們的生活怎樣了，
日子的滋味如何，以及為什麽
你們夜裏總是充滿不安和恐懼。

沒錯，恐懼，一位可愛、眼睛像做夢的
女人回答；但我知道為什麽。
人類的腦力撐不住了。
他們尋求他們找不到的
幫助和支持。長官，請看一看
——她把天使叫做「長官」！——
維特根斯坦吧。我們的哲人
和領袖都是憂郁的瘋子，
他們知道的甚至比我們
普通人還少（但她可
不普通）。

                還有呢，一個正在學
小提琴的少年說，晚上
都只是一個空紙盒，
一個沒有神秘的棺材，
而在黎明時，宇宙看上去
像電視屏幕般枯燥和陌生。
此外，那些愛音樂本身的人
少之又少。

其他人紛紛发言，悲嘆聲
洶湧而來，膨脹成憤怒的奏鳴曲。
如果先生你們想知道真相，
一個高個子學生喊道——他剛
失去母親——我們已受夠了
死亡和殘忍、迫害、疾病，
毒蛇的眼睛般呆滯的
長久的沉悶。我們土地太少，
火太多。我們不知道我們是誰。
我們迷失在森林裏，黑色的星星
在我們頭頂上懶惰地移動，彷彿
它們只是我們的夢。

但是，第二個天使靦腆地應付道，
總還有一點快樂，美的事物甚至
近在手邊，在每個時辰的
吠叫聲下，在專注安靜的心中，
還有，我們每個人身上都隱藏另一個人——
普遍，強大，不屈不撓。
野玫瑰有時會散发
童年的味道，而在假日，少女們
一如往常走到戶外散步，
她們繞圍巾的樣子
帶有某種永恒的含義。
記憶活在海洋裏，在奔騰的血中，
在黑色、燒燃的石頭裏，在詩中，
在每一次安靜的談話中。
世界跟原來一樣，
充滿陰影和期待。

他原可以繼續這樣說下去，但是人群
愈變愈大，無聲的
憤怒浪潮擴散
直到使者們終於輕輕飄起，
升入空中，他們逐漸遠去時
繼續小聲重複：願你們平靜，
願生者、死者、未出生者平靜。
唯獨第三個天使一言不发，
因為他是長久沉默的天使。

翻譯 © 黃燦然

LITTLE WALTZ

The days are so vivid, so bright
that even the slim, sparse palms
are covered in the white dust of neglect.
Serpents in the vineyards slither softly,
but the evening sea grows dark and,
suspended overhead like punctuation
in the highest script, the seagulls barely stir.
A drop of wine’s inscribed upon your lips.
The limestone hills slowly melt
on the horizon and a star appears.
At night on the square an orchestra of sailors
dressed in spotless white
plays a little waltz by Shostakovich; small children
cry as if they’d guessed
what the merry music’s really saying.
We’ve been locked in the world’s box,
love sets us free, time kills us.

trans. © Clare Cavanagh

小華爾茲

白天多麼生動，多麼明亮，
即便那細長稀疏的棕櫚樹
也罩上一層白色遺忘之塵。
蛇在葡萄園裏靜靜滑行，
黃昏時分，大海逐漸變暗，
停懸於頭頂的海鷗
像最高處文本中的標點，不輕易躁動。
一滴葡萄酒刻在你的唇上。
石灰岩的山坡慢慢融入
地平線，一顆星星出現。
深夜的廣場，一支水手管弦樂隊
白衣服一塵不染
演奏一曲肖斯塔科維奇的小華爾茲；
小孩子在哭，彷彿早已洞悉
那歡樂的音樂的真諦。
我們被鎖進世界的盒子，
愛讓我們解脫，時間教我們死亡。

翻譯 © 史春波