露易丝·格吕克：夏日花园

王立秋 译


1
几周前我发现我母亲的一张照片——
她坐在阳光下，她的脸涨红像是洋溢着成就或胜利。
太阳照耀着。几只狗
在她脚下打盹，在那里时间也睡着了，
像在所有照片中一样平静、不动。

我擦去我母亲脸上的尘埃。
的确，尘埃覆盖了一切；它在我看来就像
保护所有童年遗物的怀旧的光晕。
[她]背后，是一套公园设施，树和灌木。

太阳在空中落得更低了，影子也在拉长变黑。
我擦去的尘埃越多，这些影子也就变得越多。
夏天来了。孩子们
俯过玫瑰的边缘，他们的影子
和玫瑰的影子融合。

我想起一个词，指的
就是这种转移和变化，这种现在
已变得明显的抹除——

它出现，并同样快速地消失。
它是盲目还是黑暗，危险，混淆？

夏天来了，然后是秋天。树叶变色，
孩子们变成一团铜褐色斑中的亮点。

2
当我多少从这些事件中恢复过来的时候，
我把那张照片重新放到我发现它的地方
一本古老的平装书的书页间，
它的许多部分
在边缘处都加了注，有时是文字但更经常的
是活泼的问号和感叹号
意思是“我同意”或“我不确定，困惑中——”

墨迹已褪色。我不能分辨读者
在各处的想法
但通过伤痕似的污点我可以感到
[某种]急迫，就好像泪已滴落。

我捧了这本书一会儿。
它是《死于威尼斯》（译本）；
我标记了页码以防，就像弗洛伊德相信的那样，
没有什么是偶然。

于是这张小照片
又被埋藏起来，就像过去埋藏在未来中那样。
在页边有两个词，
被一个箭头链接：“不育”以及，页面下方的，“遗忘”——

“在他看来，那个苍白可爱的
召唤者在那里对他微笑致意……”

3
花园多静啊；
没有微风抚弄欧亚山茱萸。
夏天来了。

多安静啊
现在生活取得了胜利。粗糙的
美桐柱
支撑着静止的
叶层，

树下的草坪
油绿，闪亮——

天空中央，
是放肆的神。

事物是，他说。它们是，它们不变；
回应不会变。

多安静啊它，那舞台
和观众；看起来
呼吸也是一种干扰。

他一定很近，
草没有影子。

多么安静，多么沉默，
就像庞贝的一个夏天。

4
比阿特里斯带孩子们去西达赫斯特公园。
太阳照耀着。飞机
在头上来回经过，安静因为战争已经结束。

那是她想象的世界：
真假毫不重要。

被擦拭得焕然一新而闪闪发光——
这就是[她想象的]那个世界。尘埃
还没有喷发在事物表面。

飞机来回经过，飞向
罗马和巴黎——你不能抵达那里
除非你飞过这个公园。一切
都必须经过，没有什么能停下——

孩子们手牵手，俯身
去闻玫瑰。
他们是五岁和七岁。

无限的，无限的——这
就是她对时间的感知。

她坐在长凳上，微微隐藏在橡树背后。
远处，恐惧逼近而又离去；
车站传来它弄出来的声音。

天空粉红而又橘黄，它更老了，因为白昼已经结束。

没有风。夏日
在绿草上投下橡树形状的阴影。


A Summer Garden
Louise Glück 
  
1
Several weeks ago I discovered a photograph of my mother
sitting in the sun, her face flushed as with achievement or triumph.
The sun was shining. The dogs
were sleeping at her feet where time was also sleeping,
calm and unmoving as in all photographs.

I wiped the dust from my mother’s face.
Indeed, dust covered everything; it seemed to me the persistent
haze of nostalgia that protects all relics of childhood.
In the background, an assortment of park furniture, trees and shrubbery.

The sun moved lower in the sky, the shadows lengthened and darkened.
The more dust I removed, the more these shadows grew.
Summer arrived. The children
leaned over the rose border, their shadows
merging with the shadows of the roses.

A word came into my head, referring
to this shifting and changing, these erasures
that were now obvious—

it appeared, and as quickly vanished.
Was it blindness or darkness, peril, confusion?

Summer arrived, then autumn. The leaves turning,
the children bright spots in a mash of bronze and sienna.

2
When I had recovered somewhat from these events,
I replaced the photograph as I had found it
between the pages of an ancient paperback,
many parts of which had been
annotated in the margins, sometimes in words but more often
in spirited questions and exclamations
meaning “I agree” or “I’m unsure, puzzled—”

The ink was faded. Here and there I couldn’t tell
what thoughts occurred to the reader
but through the bruise-like blotches I could sense
urgency, as though tears had fallen.

I held the book awhile.
It was Death in Venice (in translation);
I had noted the page in case, as Freud believed,
nothing is an accident.

Thus the little photograph
was buried again, as the past is buried in the future.
In the margin there were two words,
linked by an arrow: “sterility” and, down the page, “oblivion”—

“And it seemed to him the pale and lovely
summoner out there smiled at him and beckoned...”

3
How quiet the garden is;
no breeze ruffles the Cornelian cherry.
Summer has come.

How quiet it is
now that life has triumphed. The rough

pillars of the sycamores
support the immobile
shelves of the foliage,

the lawn beneath
lush, iridescent—

And in the middle of the sky,
the immodest god.

Things are, he says. They are, they do not change;
response does not change.

How hushed it is, the stage
as well as the audience; it seems
breathing is an intrusion.

He must be very close,
the grass is shadowless.

How quiet it is, how silent,
like an afternoon in Pompeii.

4
Beatrice took the children to the park in Cedarhurst.
The sun was shining. Airplanes
passed back and forth overhead, peaceful because the war was over.

It was the world of her imagination:
true and false were of no importance.

Freshly polished and glittering—
that was the world. Dust
had not yet erupted on the surface of things.

The planes passed back and forth, bound
for Rome and Paris—you couldn’t get there
unless you flew over the park. Everything
must pass through, nothing can stop—

The children held hands, leaning
to smell the roses.
They were five and seven.

Infinite, infinite—that
was her perception of time.

She sat on a bench, somewhat hidden by oak trees.
Far away, fear approached and departed;
from the train station came the sound it made.

The sky was pink and orange, older because the day was over.

There was no wind. The summer day
cast oak-shaped shadows on the green grass.