Sara Howe，1983年生于香港，8岁时移居英国，剑桥大学英语文学博士，艾略特奖获得者。
狂乱
也许退缩
只是另一种
渴求。我是一颗蓝色的
李子，在昏暗的光线下。
你是一只老虎，你
吃自己的爪子。
那一天我们结婚时
所有的树都在颤抖
仿佛发了疯——
要对我好，你说。
FRENZIED
Maybe holding back
is just another kind
of need. I am a blue
plum in the half-light.
You are a tiger who
eats his own paws.
The day we married
all the trees trembled
as if they were mad –
be kind to me, you said.
致一切忧伤，一切心意
倚着白金的桦树
我此刻一无所求（只除了你）。
我们家里也有树的。我可否
飞给你院子里的喷泉那
午夜窸窣碎语，来安慰
你一长串的孤独梦境？
爱是柳枝，然后是流水；
婚姻，一整条街的
柠檬树，但不是苦的那种。
我被安排站在最北端：
镜面般的池子里铺开着
一个影影绰绰的世界，有云和
紫杉树，远处另一个果园，
搪瓷的亭台楼阁。
摇晃得厉害呀。
我的每一晚也是孤独者。
To all laments and purposes
Against platinum birches
I want nothing here [but you].
We have trees at home. Shall I
wing you the courtyard fountain’s
midnight palaver, to lull
the list of your lonely sleep?
Love is wicker, then water;
marriage an avenue of
limes, but not the bitter kind.
I’m stood at the north extreme:
the reflecting pool unrolls
a shadow world of clouds &
yews, another far orchard,
enamelled pavilions.
It’s shaking hardly at all.
My nights are aloner too.
带围墙的花园
马路对面，女孩们放学了，三三
两两，蹦蹦跳跳地跑向车站
或者熟悉的车子，她们的剪影，挂着
单肩背包和曲棍球棒，小毛驴一样。
记住吧，这个下午说道；紧闭的
门在我手中叮铃铃地颤动。
已经暗了，或正在变暗——
昏沉小巷上方的天空
远超一个孩子的想象。
我独自走上后街，计程车总在这里
抄近路，从后门驶过亮堂的科学实验室——
他们窗台上的吊兰种在酸奶罐里
被特大号烧杯包围着
像卑格米人在巨石面前沉思冥想。
你不能走另外一边是因为
带围墙的花园紧挨着
雨后一洼洼晶莹的柏油路；
露天排水渠里淤满了落叶。
像是要听些什么，巨大的古树
斜伸向钨灯光晕下的街道。
我在路上遇到另一个——这蜗牛
慢悠悠的粘液把沥青染成金色。
The Walled Garden
Across the road, the girls quit school in threes
and fours, tripping off at speed to stations
or familiar cars, their silhouettes, slung
with shoulder bags and hockey sticks, like mules.
Remember, says the afternoon; the shut
door shudders brassily beneath my hand.
It is already dark, or darkening –
that sky above the dimming terraced rows
goes far beyond a child’s imagining.
I tread along the backstreet where the cabs
cut through behind the luminous science labs –
their sills of spider plants in yoghurt pots
among the outsize glassware cylinders
like pygmies contemplating monoliths.
You cannot walk the other side because
the walled garden meets the road direct
in pools of spangled tarmac after rain;
the open gutter choking up with leaves.
As though to listen, the colossal trees
lean out into the tungsten-haloed street.
I meet another on the road – this snail’s
slow ribbon turns the asphalt into gold.
天空总是最坚硬的部分
1
我需要skype才能告诉你玛雅人
曾独立构思出轮子
但破晓还有三个小时才能抵达
彼得堡：你旅馆房间的黑暗里
一只钟把它的晨昏线都急得眼棱般地
红了。有没有想过你是怎么结束的
上辈子？不，你才没想过呢不是吗。不过
好几个早期文明
发明过一模一样的圆盘。也许他们烧死了你，
在古耶路撒冷的木桩上。古代玛雅
觉得可笑的圆盘滚起来
没有什么实际意义，仅仅当作
孩子们的玩具。我想说的
是谁敢伤害你，我就吃掉他们的眼睛。
2
太阳断断续续地升起，像色情gif
你摇动镜头，摄出一个全景正午。
深邃的铃声汩汩作响。我们气喘吁吁的
像素混合，分离，思念着彼此并穿过
电缆。有实体的物质需要
一个慈爱的上帝吗？你已经花了
整个早晨捕捉一群游客
推搡着穿过隐士小溪，
本能如同凝固的鱼籽般粘稠。我们虚构
真主出现在我们网络摄像头里的画面：电子
化作血肉，那喘息的节奏，窗里透出
别处的光晕。我们玩一个游戏叫做
“猜字”。我静止的字词回溯
像臭氧层的热气，自我主义的无伴奏圣歌合唱。
3
讨人嫌的月亮，总是跳出来
打扰我们的紧急任务，那傲慢的拇指印挂在
下午的取景框里。同样古老
而悲戚的尖叫从迷你轮子上传来——
固定在一只陶土羊驼的脚腕上。这
并非比喻。你的列车wifi让我
可以得知牙如何又疼了起来。
玛雅人认为时间是一个轮子。这边，
只是街头艺人的塑料小提琴。
那是隧道里的呼啸吗？你拼图一样的思绪
被我旋转，拣成小堆，按照不同级别的
青色，碎片带着无需言说的一期
月亮。我不知道这里
发生了什么。大陆在你周围游曳着，收缩着。
Sky is always the hardest part
1
I need to skype to tell you the Mayans
independently imagined the wheel
but dawn is still three hours away
in Petersburg: in your hotel room’s dark
a clock throbs its terminator eyebeam
red. Ever wonder how you died in your
last life? No, you wouldn’t would you. Besides
a bunch of early civilizations
share the selfsame gong. Maybe they burned you
at the Salem stake. The ancient Maya,
seeing no practical application
for the funny rollable disks, confined
them to children’s toys. What I mean to say
is, those who hurt you, I will eat their eyes.
2
The sun stutters up like a porny .gif
which for you pans the tracking shot of noon.
A fathomed ringtone gargles. Our breathy
pixels mingle, split, miss each other down
the wire. Does material physics call
for a personable God? You have spent
the morning caught in a shoal of tourists
muscling against the Hermitage’s stream,
instincts thick as curdled spawn. We invent
Him in our webcams’ image: electrons
made flesh, that panting beat, window onto
haloed elsewhere. We play at a game called
‘guessing thoughts’. My staticky words ping back
like ozoned heat, solipsistic plainsong.
3
The pesky moon, always bouncing away
on urgent business, its huffed thumbprint hangs
in the afternoon’s viewfinder. Same old
misery squeaks by on miniature wheels –
pinned through a clay llama’s ankles. This is
not a trope. Your on-train wi-fi means I
can hear how the tooth is hurting again.
The Mayans thought time was a wheel. This side,
only the busker’s plastic violin.
Is that a tunnel’s roar? Your jigsawed thoughts
I rotate, sort into piles of graded
cyan, the pieces with a telltale tranche
of moon. I have no idea what goes in
here. Continents swim and shrink around you. |
发表于 2018-3-5 20:47
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发表于 2018-3-7 17:25
