說話

學會說話的第一天
我的父母慶幸我不是啞巴
可我是吃什麼長大的
蠶兒在夜裏吃桑葉，我的心
在寅時吃下什麼
才吐出陽光下的第一縷絲

我開口說話——
混沌裂開的疼痛永遠留在記憶中
神性的沉默再也回不到嘴唇上：
說，拼命說……
沒有別的辦法驅趕恐懼

滔滔不絕的話語
帶著憤怒，拋向廉價的耳朵
滔滔不絕的話語
帶著歎息，落向空無——
在所有的聽眾後面，我尋找
那唯一的聽眾……

SPEAK

The day I learned to speak
my parents rejoiced I wasn’t mute,
but who knows what I ate.
Nights, silkworms grazed mulberry leaves,
my heart through the hours of Yin
browsing what it could.
At dawn I spit my first silk threads.

Through the pain of the torn primordial,
I opened my mouth,
divine silence fleeing my lips forever:
saying, desperately saying.
How else to drive back fear.

Wrath spills out with eloquence,
splashed toward common ears,
sigh-sleek words
slipping toward emptiness.
Among all who listen
I speak to only one.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

hours of Yin: In the old Chinese system of temporal division, hours of Yin was 3 to 5AM.

庭院

清貧的月光多麼慷慨
灑滿光輝的庭院裏
孩子靜靜成長

外婆活著，燕子啣泥
記憶的螢火熠熠閃爍
我掉落的第一顆牙齒
硌痛歲月的青苔

哦，童真的庭院在時光中鮮活
狗輕吠，水井照看星星
葡萄藤歡樂的觸須
伸進夢境……

COURTYARD

How rich the penniless moonlight
spills over the courtyard
where a child grows unseen.

Grandma still alive, swallows’ beaks
bearing earth to nests.
Memory lights its fireflies.
My first lost tooth
chaws the mossy past.

Time revives this courtyard,
the dog’s yip soft, the well cradling its stars.
Tendrils of these grapevines
twine their joy in dreams.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

白紙在午夜

白紙在午夜加倍索要
如同某個古老的靈魂

燈的儀式更高！
我是如此害怕這一刻
與你面對
彷彿一位被你尋找多年的證人
舉足輕重的言說將帶來轉機
（誰又能說世界不會因此跌入虛無？）
天平要求對稱，也許
將把我從這光榮的席位上呵退

尺度。光。盲夜。鑽頭……
那麼多無畏的觸點
打通暗道，扳動巨石——
黑暗顱腔的淤血
不小心打穿了海膽
筆尖，突然沖出狹窄的火山

偉大的阻力從不辜負歡樂的源泉
白紙——黑字

夜的結構禁不住發生了變化
而詞語的排浪仍在洶湧
何等的大盜將占領
「破曉」——神聖的門檻

WHITE PAPER AT MIDNIGHT

At midnight white paper demands
like some ancient soul.

The ritual lamp lifts higher.
How I fear this moment
to face you
as a witness you sought for years.
Right words earn favor.
(Who can say they won’t spill
the world toward nothing?)
Scales seek balance,
and may drive me from this splendid seat.

Dimensions. The luminous. Blind night. Drill bit.
So many brave points split boulders,
pierce the hidden path.
Clotted blood of the unlit skull,
by chance the sea urchin speared,
the pen’s slender tip volcanic.

Great resistance can’t stall joyous spring.
White paper, black strokes.

Night’s shifting frame,
words rolling in like waves,
what thief would claim
daybreak’s sacred sill?

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

在明亮的屋子裏

在一間明亮的屋子裏
回憶如一冊影集往前翻動著
你的手緊緊地抓著我的手
彷彿一旦松開
那使我們相遇的「偶然」的鏈環
就會崩落

窗外，奔走著的男人和女人
仍在相互尋找
那正是我們來自其中的黑暗——

一對靈魂在曠野上跋涉
已有了「戀人」的雛形
一張底片在慢慢顯影：
一個眼神，一個動作
都性命攸關

IN A BRIGHT ROOM

In a bright room, memory
flips through its album, your hand clutching mine
as if loosed
the link that joined us
might be lost.

Past the window dash men and women
seeking each other.
Born from that darkness, we were

two souls slogging a vast heath,
love’s embryo by then inside us,
its negative slowly taking shape:
the slightest glance, the faintest motion
vital.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

提煉

更加安靜。繼續熬制
提煉——

「首先，必須用砂鍋」
這出土文物般的器具，多麼不合時宜
「注意火候」
這是技藝的標志，不可言傳
「熬」……
漫長的被異化的過程

藥香引導你，這些陌生的根，莖，葉
將成為你的氣和血，雙目中
充滿煉金術士的秘密，狂喜
使人禁不住想確定一下你的真實年代

「只有極少數人被選中，這個年代
你是幸福的病人」

苦。這純粹的濃度
不用一滴水稀釋

CONCOCTION

Keep steeping in silence
to distill—

“First, the clay pot”,
antique, unearthed, archaic.
“Watch the fire”,
a test of skill, inexpressible.
“Steep long”,
an endless melding.

The guiding scent of herbs, strange roots,
stems, leaves, becomes your breath and blood.
Your eyes swim with alchemists’ lore,
ecstatic, uncertain of the age.

These times select so few,
you’re a happy case.

Such bitter, undilute quintessence
needs not one
drop of water.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

秋天的地址

我要去暮年的山坡上等你

我們已近得無法再近
兩顆心幾乎要透過薄薄的肉身
相互摟抱在一起

你那顆被虛無劫持過的心啊
深眼窩像寺廟裏的一對空碗
靜靜地吸附我的激烈
我終於明白飄臨大地的落葉
為何都有被歲月說服的安靜表情
而那棵舉起訣別之手的樅樹
注定要高出眾樹
高過自身——

虛無，就這樣來到我的唇上

AUTUMN ADDRESS

I’ll wait for you on the slope of my old age,

too close to be much closer.
Two hearts, this paper flesh
tearing to embrace.

Yours hijacked once by emptiness,
your eye sockets deep as temple bowls,
their hollow silence drawing all my strength.
How leaves drift toward earth,
toward calm, time’s wooing.
That fir tree, its limbs in farewell,
grown taller than any,
taller than itself.

Thus nothingness settles on my lips.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

死後的信仰

會有一雙孤兒的眼睛張開
說出這世界遺物般的重量
會有一隻狗，一路嗅著
在你騰出的空曠中流浪
會有一棵被星光瞄准的樹
繼續在黑夜裏歌唱
會有一匹預言大雪的馬
在世代的曠野上重複你的沉默
會有，會有一簇野生的雛菊
偎在墓碑的胸前
撫慰你被風雨剝蝕的孤獨

為什麼等死後才開始你的信仰？

FAITH AFTER DEATH

The orphan’s eyes open,
uttering as legacy this world’s heavy weight.
A dog sniffs by,
claiming the space you’ve left.
A tree targeted by stars
hums all night.
A horse scenting snow
echoes your silence across a timeless moor.
A clutch of wild asters
leans toward the breast of your tombstone
stroking its worn solitude.

Why wait till death
to start believing?

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

繆斯姐妹

我的詩行在琥珀裏擔水織網
忘記失散
忘記理解的芬芳
當我們相逢，我的姐妹
暴風雪沒有日期，沒有猶豫
南極是你，北極是我
一百年，幾百年
靈魂在路上磨成加速之光

「後現代」還有事可幹嗎——
哪根稻草最後壓倒駱駝
我走之後，它又盤剝了誰的租子
又鋸斷誰的琴弦
厚厚的病曆裏有多少發黴的患者
修正多少無邪的藥方
還有沒有道路通向心臟
有沒有事件
讓石斛仙草不再炫耀人工栽培
重回深山密林開放
……

我曾與「後現代」擦身而過
我的發聲
不經過炒作概念的假牙
我的名字不與任何年代押韻
我的詩行殘缺零落
甘願出走地火煤層
——不留一封晾曬的遺囑
讓後事枯萎
徑直抵達更深更暗的故鄉

我將隨你走回隔世的農場
聽你以青稞的音調
看你以火焰的訣別
牽著與我一樣孤獨的衣袂
講述相逢也是重逢
然後，寫下——
晶瑩的苦難
高過奧林匹斯山眾神的頭頂
孕育繆斯
追隨滄海桑田的優雅……

MUSE SISTERS

My poems shoulder water, knit webs in amber.
Forget we once were close.
Forget the sweet scent of understanding.
When we meet, my sisters,
the hour of that blizzard unknown, unstoppable,
you’ll be the south pole, I the north.
A hundred years, three,
the soul on its journey
tapers to a streak of light.

“Postmodern”: what’s left—
what straw finally stoops the camel?
I refused, but its usuries
keep cutting musical strings.
In thick medical files, how many mouldering patients,
how many naive prescriptions to correct?
Are there yet pathways to the heart,
moments to make divine orchids
bloom wild again in deep mountains, dense forest?

I brushed the postmodern once—
my voice stalled
at its false teeth, gimmicky conceits.
My name rhymes with no era.
My scattered lines
pitch toward earth’s molten core,
no will and testament hung for all to see.
Let there be no funerary rites,
but a plunge to their darker home.

Through the fields of another life,
I’ll walk with you,
hear your highland barley tune,
attend your fiery farewell,
tugging at a lonesome sleeve.
Write then
the crystalline misery
taller than Olympic gods.
Bred by the muse,
I serve an inverted elegance.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

七塊骨碴

捧著你被火焰裝訂成灰燼的孤本
像捧著一塊剛剛迸出地心的花崗岩
七十個年輪灼燙的結晶
收藏在這隻深褐色的木匣裏
等待我用慢慢冷卻的髓質的悲涼
細細釋讀：父親——
這部無字的大書

或許，每個來到世間的生命
最終，都要將這易朽的肉身僅剩的
死神也啃不動的骨頭，送入地層深處
與所有骸骨一起，共同加固、支撐
年邁的不堪重負的大地
當這隻緊緊依偎著我心跳的木匣
——這隻滿載我錐心疼痛的小舟
不得不在暮靄沉沉合攏的催迫裏
從我聲聲呼喚、挽留的臂彎解纜
從此漂向茫茫永夜的洪荒……
那一刻，那從血脈深處迸湧的
撕心裂肺的爆發
使我終於撕掉那牢牢粘貼住心扉的
「儀規」的封條
迎著親友眾目睽睽的驚愕
像翻開一本我渴望已久的書籍的封面
我掀開骨灰盒薄薄的蓋子
將痙攣的失去知覺的手臂
伸進去——
伸進那堆穿過死亡的煉火
仍保留著你生命驚人溫度的
熾白的骨碴和粉末：
索要烈焰焚心的紀念

一鍬鍬急雨般落向墓坑的泥土
落向深不見底——沒有回音的夜
我轉身，攥緊手中——
七塊鋒利的骨碴摩擦的磷火
在喧囂人世的寂寂裏穿行
一支被此岸——彼岸
這拉滿的弓弦射出的箭鏃
在渴念中無望地加速——
為那抹也許我永遠無法追上的
那如甘露般，從你嘴角凝固的
深深褶皺裏，緩緩沁出的
最後的微笑

SEVEN SHARDS OF BONE

Only one copy of the flame-bound
book of ash, held in both hands
like a flake of granite sprung from earth’s core,
like scorched quartz, these bones’
seventy annular rings
enshrined in their dark wood box,
awaiting close perusal
when my own sad marrow cools:
father—
big book, wordless.

Each life lands in this world,
its rind of flesh so soon decayed,
maybe these bones, sunk deep
with all that death won’t gnaw,
gird up the ancient soil
which cannot bear much more.
This wooden boat, packed with grief’s cargo
and bobbing at my pulse,
shuts tight amid the dusky mist,
slips from my arms, my voice,
drifting toward vast primal night.
In my veins the burst heart
tears its seal of custom,
and shameless I raise the lid
as if turning to a page,
my cramped, numb arm clutching
at the mound of white-blazed
shards and dust,
still warm as life
after death’s cold fire,
to snatch these fragments.

Like sudden rain, earth patters down
to the grave’s soundless night.
Clenched in my hands, seven shards
chafe their spectral glow.
I pass silent through this clamorous world,
the last look on his seamed, stiffening face
the arc of an arrow
speeding from one hopeless shore
to the other,
farther than my longest reach.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell

遺產
——給茨維塔耶娃

妳省下的糧食還在發酵
這是我必須喝下的酒
妳省下的燈油還在歎息
這是我必須熬過的夜

妳整夜在星群間踱步
在那兒抽煙，咳嗽
難道妳的痛苦還沒有完成
還在轉動那只非人的磨盤

妳測量過的深淵我還在測量
妳烏雲的里程又在等待我的喘息
苦難，一筆繼承不完的遺產
領我走向妳——

看著妳的照片，我哭了：
我與我的老年在鏡中重逢
莫非妳某個眼神的暗示
白髮像一場火災在我頭上蔓延

LEGACY

for Tsvetaeva

The grains you saved are still fermenting.
This the wine I must swallow.
The kerosene you saved still sighs.
This the night I must endure.

All night you stroll the constellations,
smoking, coughing,
your pain unfinished,
grinding its inhuman mill.

The abyss you plumbed I still measure,
your dark clouds’ millage
waiting for my breath,
woe’s undying legacy
leading me to you.

I wept at your photograph
mirroring my own decline.
Your slightest glance, my hair
a white conflagration.

trans. © Diana Shi & George O’Connell