约翰·瑞博坦兹：一个光的世界

adieudusk 译

如果此刻闭上眼睛，我还能看见他们
被我的太阳帽帽檐遮挡着：
三个孩子蹲在高大的翠柳前
那树间狭窄的一圈地上
各为孤岛，悄无声息，准备好要网罗一只青蛙，
青蛙要跳的池塘（它已逃掉）
一面将被它的跃水打破的玻璃。
这浑然的景象
以它的密喜悦了我的心灵之眼，
这树干，泥土和高草繁密交错的图景
不见丝毫破绽，我也看不到倾注其上的光源
只一股幽蓝在池塘的绿玻璃上燃烧。

草枯缩，树吹低，大地抓住
那青蛙，孩子们长大了。天空冰蓝的火焰
沿着它要燃尽的焰芯骚动。


A World of Light

John Reibetanz

If I close my eyes now, I can still see them
canopied by the visor of my sunhat:
three children islanded on a narrow rim
of earth between the huge crack-willow that
they squat before, hushed, poised to net a frog,
and the pond the frog will jump to (it got away)
a glass its dive will shatter.
The unbroken image
pleases my mind’s eye with its density,
such thick crisscross of tree-trunk, earth, and tall grass
I see no breach, no source for the light that steeps it
but a blue burning in the pond’s green glass.

The grass withered, the tree blew down, earth caught
the frog, the children grew. Sky’s ice-blue flame
teased along the wick it would consume.