露易絲·博根(Louise Bogan，1897-1970)，1897年出生于美國緬因州的利佛莫爾福爾斯鎮(zhèn)。她一生坎坷，患有輕微的精神抑郁癥。許多評論家認為：博根創(chuàng)造了一種不同于傳統(tǒng)女性的抒情詩歌，將克制、含蓄與細膩和優(yōu)雅完整地結(jié)合起來。她的大部分作品出版于1938年之前，主要包括《死亡的身體》（Body of This Death，1923），《黑暗的夏季》（Dark Summer，1929），《沉睡的憤怒》（The Sleeping Fury，1937），以及選集《河口：1923年—1968年詩選》（The Blue Estuaries: Poems, 1923-1968，1968）。
胡安之歌
當(dāng)美裂成碎片，紛紛落下，
我并不悲傷，只感到驚奇。
當(dāng)愛像一個脆弱的殼，被摔破了，
我沒有保留它的碎片作為紀(jì)念。
我從不將一個男人引為朋友，
他不理解愛必須結(jié)束。
我從不將一個女孩當(dāng)作情人，
她能察覺愛已經(jīng)結(jié)束了。
智者懷疑，愚者相信——
那么，愛，欺騙的是誰？
（倪志娟 譯）
一個浪漫女人的墓志銘
她得到了
她夢想的永恒，那里，古老的石頭躺在陽光下。
雜草輕撫著她，
節(jié)奏平穩(wěn)而迅捷，像年輕男人正在奔跑。
她總是真誠地愛著
其他活著的人——她聽見他們的笑聲。
她躺在無人躺過的地方，
當(dāng)然，也無人跟隨。
（倪志娟 譯）
Epitaph For A Romantic Woman
She has attained the permanence
She dreamed of, where old stones lie sunning.
Untended stalks blow over her
Even and swift, like young men running.
Always in the heart she loved
Others had lived, -- she heard their laughter.
She lies where none has lain before,
Where certainly none will follow after.
從一次地獄旅行中帶回的孤獨經(jīng)驗
午夜的眼淚
流入你的耳中。
（倪志娟 譯）
孤獨的人
在長久的憤怒中，
審視光，黑暗，
鏡子和書頁。
你尋找的，不過是你自己。
里面映射的
是那些眼睛，和濃密的頭發(fā)，
是熱情的面容，笑聲。
你將出現(xiàn)在
書中，或者在鍍銀的玻璃中，
被復(fù)制，被釋放；
進入你將經(jīng)過的
所有其他人的身體。
玻璃不會消融；
鏡子像墻壁一樣站立；
被印刷的書頁通過另一雙手
歸還詞語。
而你迷醉的眼睛，
在下文中沒有遇見它自己；
陌生人躺在你的懷里，
如同我此時一樣。
（倪志娟 譯）
Man Alone
It is yourself you seek
In a long rage,
Scanning through light and darkness
Mirrors, the page,
Where should reflected be
Those eyes and that thick hair,
That passionate look, that laughter.
You should appear
Within the book, or doubled,
Freed, in the silvered glass;
Into all other bodies
Yourself should pass.
The glass does not dissolve;
Like walls the mirrors stand;
The printed page gives back
Words by another hand.
And your infatuate eye
Meets not itself below;
Strangers lie in your arms
As I lie now.
睡眠中的眼淚
整夜，公雞在亮如白晝的月光下鳴叫，
而我，在睡眠的牢籠中，在一個陌生人的胸脯上
流淚，像一個無法擺脫的使命——
在虛假的光中，虛假的悲傷在我歡樂的床上，
眼淚的勞作，抵消了歡愉的無所事事。
我不會喚醒你的話，我讓眼淚去說。
我攀緊夢的柵欄，它們被說出，
痛苦嘲弄的手使我平息，
夜晚，散發(fā)出火焰，黑暗再次降臨。
（倪志娟 譯）
Tears In Sleep
All night the cocks crew, under a moon like day,
And I, in the cage of sleep, on a stranger's breast,
Shed tears, like a task not to be put away---
In the false light, false grief in my happy bed,
A labor of tears, set against joy's undoing.
I would not wake at your word, I had tears to say.
I clung to the bars of the dream and they were said,
And pain's derisive hand had given me rest
From the night giving off flames, and the dark renewing.
肖像
她不必擔(dān)心收獲的
秋季，果園中架起的
的梯子，不擔(dān)心潮水
從陡峭的沙灘上消退。
不任由痛苦泛濫，
她身體的堡壘，堅硬而荒涼，
也不是一個望遠鏡，能預(yù)見
另一個人的毀滅。
她已得到和失去的，
不會再失去。
她，曾被男人所愛，現(xiàn)在
被時間擁有。
（倪志娟 譯）
Portrait
She has no need to fear the fall
Of harvest from the laddered reach
Of orchards, nor the tide gone ebbing
From the steep beach.
Nor hold to pain's effrontery
Her body's bulwark, stern and savage,
Nor be a glass, where to forsee
Another's ravage.
What she has gathered, and what lost,
She will not find to lose again.
She is possessed by time, who once
Was loved by men.
十四行詩
既然你自稱是我思想的源頭，
那么，請除去使它陷落的陷阱，
那蘆葦叢中，其他人
能捕獲它的陷阱。請用魔法召喚
炙熱的火焰，或者一場雪，徹底
清除。它將獲得自由。
無論什么網(wǎng)誘張著，想捕獲我，
你的眼睛必定照看著，讓它逃離。
我的嘴，也許可以很好地了解，
我的身體卻聽不見它自己的回聲，
而絕望的精神，將傲慢又瘋狂地
追隨風(fēng)暴，擺脫控制我們的
嚴厲符咒，扯緊風(fēng)，在電閃雷鳴的云中
直接投向它的自由。
（倪志娟 譯）
Sonnet
Since you would claim the sources of my thought
Recall the meshes whence it sprang unlimed,
The reedy traps which other hands have times
To close upon it. Conjure up the hot
Blaze that it cleared so cleanly, or the snow
Devised to strike it down. It will be free.
Whatever nets draw in to prison me
At length your eyes must turn to watch it go.
My mouth, perhaps, may learn one thing too well,
My body hear no echo save its own,
Yet will the desperate mind, maddened and proud,
Seek out the storm, escape the bitter spell
That we obey, strain to the wind, be thrown
Straight to its freedom in the thunderous cloud
羅馬噴泉
我看見水，從青銅座向上
噴灑，到達最高處，
再落下，仿佛靜止在空中，
光滑地流淌。
陰影似的青銅座，
一種人造的物件，
塑造了直立在空中的
透明清澈的水流。
哦，如同拿著錘子的手臂，
它善于努力地
敲打出這完整的形象，
回聲斷斷續(xù)續(xù)，
而向上奔涌的水，
跟隨夏日的空氣，調(diào)皮地
躍進噴泉池。
（倪志娟 譯）
Roman Fountain
Up from the bronze, I saw
Water without a flaw
Rush to its rest in air,
Reach to its rest, and fall.
Bronze of the blackest shade,
An element man-made,
Shaping upright the bare
Clear gouts of water in air.
O, as with arm and hammer,
Still it is good to strive
To beat out the image whole,
To echo the shout and stammer
When full-gushed waters, alive,
Strike on the fountain's bowl
After the air of summer.
遠景盡頭的山
來，讓我們分辨溝渠中的種子，
曾經(jīng)富有的我們，此刻多么貧窮，
躺在牛群啃噬過的
貧瘠而潮濕的牧場，
秋天的夜晚，為這個小鎮(zhèn)
帶來安寧。
來，讓我們告誡冷漠的陌生人，
我們?nèi)绾螌で蟀踩?，卻愛上了危險。
因此，靠著堅硬的墻壁，我們
選擇了更脆弱的邊界：
山那邊，明亮的白楊，高大的橡樹，
淡成了一片輕煙。
（倪志娟 譯）
Last Hill In A Vista
Come, let us tell the weeds in ditches
How we are poor, who once had riches,
And lie out in the sparse and sodden
Pastures that the cows have trodden,
The while an autumn night seals down
The comforts of the wooden town.
Come, let us counsel some cold stranger
How we sought safety, but loved danger.
So, with stiff walls about us, we
Chose this more fragile boundary:
Hills, where light poplars, the firm oak,
Loosen into a little smoke.
煉金術(shù)士
我焚燒我的生命，也許我能找到
完全屬于精神的熱情，
從眼睛和骨頭中剝離思想，
讓迷狂獨自存在。
我破壞我的生活，為了擺脫
愛和悲傷那破碎的光芒。
純粹的火焰跳躍著，
燒焦了存在和欲望。
它變得虛弱，停止了悸動。
我看到毫無神秘可言的肉體——
并非精神的狂熱本質(zhì)——仍然
充滿不受意志約束的熱情。
（倪志娟 譯）
The Alchemist
I burned my life, that I might find
A passion wholly of the mind,
Thought divorced from eye and bone,
Ecstasy come to breath alone.
I broke my life, to seek relief
From the flawed light of love and grief.
With mounting beat the utter fire
Charred existence and desire.
It died low, ceased its sudden thresh.
I had found unmysterious flesh --
Not the mind's avid substance -- still
Passionate beyond the will
美杜莎
我已來到這所房子，它在樹洞中，
面對著清澈的天空。
一切都在移動——一只鈴鐺懸掛著準(zhǔn)備敲響，
太陽和倒影旋轉(zhuǎn)著。
我看見了直率的眼睛
和嘶嘶作響的頭發(fā)，
她正靠著窗子，向門外看。
極其直率的眼睛，額頭上
盤繞著的蛇。
這是一幅永恒的死亡景象。
沒有任何生機。
結(jié)局絕不會使它變得更明亮，
雨也不能模糊它。
水將總是向下流，但不會落下，
傾斜的鈴鐺不會發(fā)出聲音。
草，深深扎根在土地，
生長，只是為了變成干草。
而我將站在這里，像一個影子，
在無比安寧的日子，
注視著黃色的塵土，它們在風(fēng)中飄浮，
但不會散去。
（倪志娟 譯）
Medusa
I had come to the house, in a cave of trees,
Facing a sheer sky.
Everything moved, -- a bell hung ready to strike,
Sun and reflection wheeled by.
When the bare eyes were before me
And the hissing hair,
Held up at a window, seen through a door.
The stiff bald eyes, the serpents on the forehead
Formed in the air.
This is a dead scene forever now.
Nothing will ever stir.
The end will never brighten it more than this,
Nor the rain blur.
The water will always fall, and will not fall,
And the tipped bell make no sound.
The grass will always be growing for hay
Deep on the ground.
And I shall stand here like a shadow
Under the great balanced day,
My eyes on the yellow dust, that was lifting in the wind,
And does not drift away.
離別之言
沒有什么被記住，沒有什么被遺忘。
當(dāng)我們醒來，馬車正駛過溫暖的夏日大道，
窗臺被夜晚的雨水淋濕，
鳥兒停歇在煙囪周圍
如同停歇在一些奇怪的樹上。
沒有什么被接受，沒有什么被忽略。
微弱的鐘聲劃分了每一個鐘點，
下午散發(fā)著涼爽的氣息，
人們在越來越冷清的街頭踟躕。
月亮，和店鋪前的光，亮著
黃昏如傾斜的水，降臨。
手緊握著手，
額頭仍然緊抵著額頭——
沒有什么被丟失，沒有什么被擁有，
沒有禮物也沒有拒絕。
2
我已記住你。
你不是曾被探訪的小鎮(zhèn)，
也不是在奔跑的腳下逝去的小路。
你笨拙如肉體
比霜或灰燼更輕。
你是殼，
是白色汁液的蘋果，
是歌，是等待音樂的詞語。
3
你已學(xué)會了開始：
從我走向其他人。
相伴；吃，跳舞，絕望，
睡，被威脅，容忍。
你明白了這種方式。
但最后，是無禮；
是荒唐——突然地刪除一切；
是瘋狂——絕不再談起，
戴著沉默中開放的花。
離別，沒有火把或燈籠，
使你的離別充滿了某種不確定性。
（倪志娟 譯）
Words For Departure
Nothing was remembered, nothing forgotten.
When we awoke, wagons were passing on the warm summer pavements,
The window-sills were wet from rain in the night,
Birds scattered and settled over chimneypots
As among grotesque trees.
Nothing was accepted, nothing looked beyond.
Slight-voiced bells separated hour from hour,
The afternoon sifted coolness
And people drew together in streets becoming deserted.
There was a moon, and light in a shop-front,
And dusk falling like precipitous water.
Hand clasped hand
Forehead still bowed to forehead--
Nothing was lost, nothing possessed
There was no gift nor denial.
2
I have remembered you.
You were not the town visited once,
Nor the road falling behind running feet.
You were as awkward as flesh
And lighter than frost or ashes.
You were the rind,
And the white-juiced apple,
The song, and the words waiting for music.
3
You have learned the beginning;
Go from mine to the other.
Be together; eat, dance, despair,
Sleep, be threatened, endure.
You will know the way of that.
But at the end, be insolent;
Be absurd--strike the thing short off;
Be mad--only do not let talk
Wear the bloom from silence.
And go away without fire or lantern
Let there be some uncertainty about your departure.
理解
現(xiàn)在，我明白了
熱情如何溫暖
泥土中的一點肉體，
而珠寶是脆弱的，——
我將躺在這里，了解
樹，如何在它們的土地上
投下長長的陰影，
和一種輕柔的聲音。
（倪志娟 譯）
Knowledge
Now that I know
How passion warms little
Of flesh in the mould,
And treasure is brittle,--
I'll lie here and learn
How, over their ground
Trees make a long shadow
And a light sound.
約定
你曾將雙手放在我身上，還有你的唇，
你念著我的名字如同祈禱。
這里，樹種滿河岸，
我留意過你的眼睛，清澈，毫無遺憾，
而你的唇，關(guān)閉著愛不能說出的一切。
我的母親記得她子宮的疼痛，
長久以來，她期望的遠不止這一點。
她說；“你不愛我，
你不需要我，
你終會離開我?！?/span>
在我去往的國度中，
我將無法看見朋友的臉，
以及她烈日下枯草色的頭發(fā)，
同時，我們也無法擁有
這樣一片土地，山間懸掛著新月，
空中劃過飛鳥的蹤跡。
我曾如何設(shè)想愛？
我說：“它是美和憂愁?！?/span>
我曾以為，它將帶給我失去的歡樂，和輝煌
如同往昔歲月吹來的一縷風(fēng)……
但是，此時只有黃昏
和柳樹的細葉
間或掠過水面的聲音。
（倪志娟 譯）
夢
哦，上帝，夢中那匹可怕的馬，
開始在空中刨蹄子，對著我噴氣，
埋藏了35年的恐懼，從它的鬃毛上傾瀉而下，
幾乎同樣古老的報復(fù)，從它的鼻孔噴出。
當(dāng)某種強壯的生物躍起，扯緊了韁繩。
我，一個徹頭徹尾的懦夫，只能躺在地板上流淚，
我迷迷糊糊躺著時，另一個女人
跳到空中，拽緊了皮革和鏈子。
給他，她說，把你的一些東西給他作為符咒。
扔給他，她說，把你特有的一些卑微之物扔給他。
不，不，我叫喊著，他恨我；他的出現(xiàn)只是為了傷害，
無論我是否屈服，結(jié)果都一樣。
但是，如同傳說中的獅子，當(dāng)我
從冰冷的右手，褪下浸透汗水的手套，扔過去；
這可怕的野獸，令人難以理喻地
走到我身邊，低下它愛戀的頭顱。
（倪志娟 譯）
The Dream
O God, in the dream the terrible horse began
To paw at the air, and make for me with his blows,
Fear kept for thirty-five years poured through his mane,
And retribution equally old, or nearly, breathed through his nose.
Coward complete, I lay and wept on the ground
When some strong creature appeared, and leapt for the rein.
Another woman, as I lay half in a swound
Leapt in the air, and clutched at the leather and chain.
Give him, she said, something of yours as a charm.
Throw him, she said, some poor thing you alone claim.
No, no, I cried, he hates me; he is out for harm,
And whether I yield or not, it is all the same.
But, like a lion in a legend, when I flung the glove
Pulled from my sweating, my cold right hand;
The terrible beast, that no one may understand,
Came to my side, and put down his head in love.
女人
女人的內(nèi)心并不雜亂，
相反，她們很精明，
內(nèi)心寧靜溫暖，
甘于啃布滿塵土的面包。
她們不看牛吃紅色的冬草，
她們不聽雪水
在淺而清澈的溝渠中
流動。
當(dāng)她們應(yīng)該踏上旅程時，她們等待，
當(dāng)她們應(yīng)該屈服時，她們強硬。
她們反對自己大發(fā)慈悲
將男人當(dāng)做朋友。
她們無法想象一塊田里有那么多作物，
或者一把斧頭能劈開那么多整齊的木頭。
她們的愛是一種急切的虛無，
要么太緊，要么太松。
她們傾聽任何一種低語，
一聲叫喊或者哭泣。
很可能，在她們將生活帶進她們的門檻之前，
她們本應(yīng)對它視而不見。
（倪志娟 譯）
Women
Women have no wilderness in them,
They are provident instead,
Content in the tight hot cell of their hearts
To eat dusty bread.
They do not see cattle cropping red winter grass,
They do not hear
Snow water going down under culverts
Shallow and clear.
They wait, when they should turn to journeys,
They stiffen, when they should bend.
They use against themselves that benevolence
To which no man is friend.
They cannot think of so many crops to a field
Or of clean wood cleft by an axe.
Their love is an eager meaninglessness
Too tense, or too lax.
They hear in every whisper that speaks to them
A shout and a cry.
As like as not, when they take life over their door-sills
They should let it go by.
嫁接的蘋果
讓我為你詳細說說
我果園中的豐收情況。
我的蘋果樹，為我結(jié)出了一些果實。
包含不同的品種：
外表光滑和帶條紋的；紅色和赤褐色的；綠色和黃色的；
還有酸的或甜的。
在那棵無人照看的蘋果樹上，
兩個品種相遇了——
因此，它結(jié)出的蘋果，一半是毫無瑕疵的紅，
而另一半
是雪白的。它是一個可愛的蘋果。
它屬于你。
它有五個豌豆一般大的果核，
你會發(fā)現(xiàn)，
它們將長成五棵結(jié)實高大，
品種不同的蘋果樹：
為你提供取火的木頭，遮陰的葉子，
以及做果醬的蘋果。
哦，對少女而言，這是一個好蘋果，
它是一個雜交品種，
它的果肉緊密，有絲一般的條紋
是珍品中的珍品。
紅色的一邊甜蜜如火，而白色的一邊
如牧場上的牛奶。
吃它時，你能品嘗到果實之外的東西：
包括花，
陽光，空氣，根部的黑暗，
雨，露水，
我們從之而來的土地，我們逃避的時間，
以及火焰和胸膛。
我要白色的那一半，女孩，那是屬于我的。
剩余的部分歸你。
（倪志娟 譯）
The Crossed Apple
I’ve come to give you fruit from out my orchard,
Of wide report.
I have trees there that bear me many apples.
Of every sort:
Clear, streaked; red and russet; green and golden;
Sour and sweet.
This apple’s from a tree yet unbeholden,
Where two kinds meet, -
So that this side is red without a dapple,
And this side’s hue
Is clear and snowy. It’s a lovely apple.
It is for you.
Within are five black pips as big as peas,
As you will find,
Potent to breed you five great apple trees
Of varying kind:
To breed you wood for fire, leaves for shade,
Apples for sauce.
Oh, this is a good apple for a maid,
It is a cross,
Fine on the finer, so the flesh is tight,
And grained like silk.
Sweet Burning gave the red side, and the white
Is Meadow Milk.
Eat it, and you will taste more than the fruit:
The blossom, too,
The sun, the air, the darkness at the root,
The rain, the dew,
The earth we came to, and the time we flee,
The fire and the breast.
I claim the white part, maiden, that’s for me.
You take the rest.
夜晚
在遙遠冷漠的島嶼
和憂郁的河口，
港灣動蕩的風(fēng)，
吹拂著，吹拂著
上漲的潮水
涌動著，涌動著；
那里的貝殼和野草
忍受著大海的咸，
晴朗的夜晚，星星
向著西邊褪去它的光芒，
消失在陸地之后；
那里綿綿無盡的海水，
拍打著巖石；
無云的夜晚，
水，再次映照出
蒼穹的片段；
——哦，請記住
在不斷消逝的黑暗的時光中，
移動著比心臟中的血液
更多的事物。
（倪志娟 譯）
云中飄來的幾種聲音
來吧，醉鬼和癮君子；來吧，喪失了勇氣的墮落者！
接受這頂桂冠吧，雖然是遲來的榮譽，你們卻
受之無愧。
目光短淺的愚人，見風(fēng)使舵者，正人君子，上流人士，
請滾遠一點，不要碰這桂冠。它是不朽的，
絕不屬于你們
（倪志娟 譯）
豎琴之歌
我所依偎著的風(fēng)景
再次從枝群中釋放夏天；
形成那濃重的樹蔭
八月蔥蘢的樹葉，必然
在風(fēng)的晦暗里，
舞動整晚。
很快，秋日潺潺的小溪，
流回到畫里的夜晚，
正如在睡眠的歡欣里
它留在了夢幻，
輕輕的蘇醒,它那聲音
傾瀉在大地的冰寒。
不久樹葉蜂擁而起；
噢，愛，當(dāng)夜晚
隔開我的睡眠，當(dāng)星辰，
秋水，沉靜隔開我的夢幻，
盡管，想哭，我曾
離它的聲音甚遠，
它的嗓音依然屬于夜晚。
（靳乾 譯）
Song For a Lyre
The landscape where I lie
Again from boughs sets free
Summer; all night must fly
In wind’s obscurity
The thick, green leaves that made
Heavy the August shade.
Soon, in the pictured night,
Returns—as in a dream
Left after sleep’s delight—
The shallow autumn stream:
Softly awake, its sound
Poured on the chilly ground.
Soon fly the leaves in throngs;
O love, though once I lay
Far from its sound, to weep,
When night divides my sleep,
When stars, the autumn stream,
Stillness, divide my dream,
Night to your voice belongs.
Men Loved Wholly Beyond Wisdom
Men loved wholly beyond wisdom
Have the staff without the banner.
Like a fire in a dry thicket
Rising within women's eyes
Is the love men must return.
Heart, so subtle now, and trembling,
What a marvel to be wise.,
To love never in this manner!
To be quiet in the fern
Like a thing gone dead and still,
Listening to the prisoned cricket
Shake its terrible dissembling
Music in the granite hill.
Leave-Taking
I do not know where either of us can turn
Just at first, waking from the sleep of each other.
I do not know how we can bear
The river struck by the gold plummet of the moon,
Or many trees shaken together in the darkness.
We shall wish not to be alone
And that love were not dispersed and set free—
Though you defeat me,
And I be heavy upon you.
But like earth heaped over the heart
Is love grown perfect.
Like a shell over the beat of life
Is love perfect to the last.
So let it be the same
Whether we turn to the dark or to the kiss of another;
Let us know this for leavetaking,
That I may not be heavy upon you,
That you may blind me no more.
Juan's Song
When beauty breaks and falls asunder
I feel no grief for it, but wonder.
When love, like a frail shell, lies broken,
I keep no chip of it for token.
I never had a man for friend
Who did not know that love must end.
I never had a girl for lover
Who could discern when love was over.
What the wise doubt, the fool believes--
Who is it, then, that love deceives?
Chanson Un Peu Na?ve
What body can be ploughed,
Sown, and broken yearly?
But she would not die, she vowed,
But she has, nearly.
Sing, heart sing;
Call and carol clearly.
And, since she could not die,
Care would be a feather,
A film over the eye
Of two that lie together.
Fly, song, fly,
Break your little tether.
So from strength concealed
She makes her pretty boast:
Plain is a furrow healed
And she may love you most.
Cry, song, cry,
And hear your crying lost.
Cassandra
To me, one silly task is like another.
I bare the shambling tricks of lust and pride.
This flesh will never give a child its mother,—
Song, like a wing, tears through my breast, my side,
And madness chooses out my voice again,
Again. I am the chosen no hand saves:
The shrieking heaven lifted over men,
Not the dumb earth, wherein they set their graves.
Betrothed
You have put your two hands upon me, and your mouth,
You have said my name as a prayer.
Here where trees are planted by the water
I have watched your eyes, cleansed from regret,
And your lips, closed over all that love cannot say,
My mother remembers the agony of her womb
And long years that seemed to promise more than this.
She says, 'You do not love me,
You do not want me,
You will go away.'
In the country whereto I go
I shall not see the face of my friend
Nor her hair the color of sunburnt grasses;
Together we shall not find
The land on whose hills bends the new moon
In air traversed of birds.
What have I thought of love?
I have said, 'It is beauty and sorrow.'
I have thought that it would bring me lost delights, and splendor
As a wind out of old time . . .
But there is only the evening here,
And the sound of willows
Now and again dipping their long oval leaves in the water.
A Tale
This youth too long has heard the break
Of waters in a land of change.
He goes to see what suns can make
From soil more indurate and strange.
He cuts what holds his days together
And shuts him in, as lock on lock:
The arrowed vane announcing weather,
The tripping racket of a clock;
Seeking, I think, a light that waits
Still as a lamp upon a shelf, --
A land with hills like rocky gates
Where no sea leaps upon itself.
But he will find that nothing dares
To be enduring, save where, south
Of hidden deserts, torn fire glares
On beauty with a rusted mouth, --
Where something dreadful and another
Look quietly upon each other.
Zone
We have struck the regions wherein we are keel or reef.
The wind breaks over us,
And against high sharp angles almost splits into words,
And these are of fear or grief.
Like a ship, we have struck expected latitudes
Of the universe, in March.
Through one short segment’s arch
Of the zodiac’s round
We pass,
Thinking: Now we hear
What we heard last year,
And bear the wind’s rude touch
And its ugly sound
Equally with so much
We have learned how to bear.
To Be Sung On The Water
Beautiful, my delight,
Pass, as we pass the wave.
Pass, as the mottled night
Leaves what it cannot save,
Scattering dark and bright.
Beautiful, pass and be
Less than the guiltless shade
To which our vows were said;
Less than the sound of the oar
To which our vows were made, -
Less than the sound of its blade
Dipping the stream once more.
To A Dead Lover
The dark is thrown
Back from the brightness, like hair
Cast over a shoulder.
I am alone,
Four years older;
Like the chairs and the walls
Which I once watched brighten
With you beside me. I was to waken
Never like this, whatever came or was taken.
The stalk grows, the year beats on the wind.
Apples come, and the month for their fall.
The bark spreads, the roots tighten.
Though today be the last
Or tomorrow all,
You will not mind.
That I may not remember
Does not matter.
I shall not be with you again.
What we knew, even now
Must scatter
And be ruined, and blow
Like dust in the rain.
You have been dead a long season
And have less than desire
Who were lover with lover;
And I have life—that old reason
To wait for what comes,
To leave what is over.
The Frightened Man
In fear of the rich mouth
I kissed the thin,--
Even that was a trap
To snare me in.
Even she, so long
The frail, the scentless,
Is become strong,
And proves relentless.
O, forget her praise,
And how I sought her
Through a hazardous maze
By shafted water.
Statue And Birds
Here, in the withered arbor, like the arrested wind,
Straight sides, carven knees,
Stands the statue, with hands flung out in alarm
Or remonstrances.
Over the lintel sway the woven bracts of the vine
In a pattern of angles.
The quill of the fountain falters, woods rake on the sky
Their brusque tangles.
The birds walk by slowly, circling the marble girl,
The golden quails,
The pheasants, closed up in their arrowy wings,
Dragging their sharp tails.
The inquietudes of the sap and of the blood are spent.
What is forsaken will rest.
But her heel is lifted,—she would flee,—the whistle of the birds
Fails on her breast.
Song For The Last Act
Now that I have your face by heart, I look
Less at its features than its darkening frame
Where quince and melon, yellow as young flame,
Lie with quilled dahlias and the shepherd's crook.
Beyond, a garden, There, in insolent ease
The lead and marble figures watch the show
Of yet another summer loath to go
Although the scythes hang in the apple trees.
Now that I have your face by heart, I look.
Now that I have your voice by heart, I read
In the black chords upon a dulling page
Music that is not meant for music's cage,
Whose emblems mix with words that shake and bleed.
The staves are shuttled over with a stark
Unprinted silence. In a double dream
I must spell out the storm, the running stream.
The beat's too swift. The notes shift in the dark.
Now that I have your voice by heart, I read.
Now that I have your heart by heart, I see
The wharves with their great ships and architraves;
The rigging and the cargo and the slaves
On a strange beach under a broken sky.
O not departure, but a voyage done!
The bales stand on the stone; the anchor weeps
Its red rust downward, and the long vine creeps
Beside the salt herb, in the lengthening sun.
Now that I have your heart by heart, I see.
A Letter
I came here, being stricken, stumbling out
At last from streets; the sun, decreasing, took me
For days, the time being the last of autumn,
The thickets not yet stark, but quivering
With tiny colors, like some brush strokes in
The manner of the pointillists; small yellows
Dart shaped, little reds in different pattern,
Clicks and notches of color on threaded bushes,
A cracked and fluent heaven, and a brown earth.
I had these, and my food and sleep—enough.
This is a countryside of roofless houses,—
Taverns to rain,—doorsteps of millstones, lintels
Leaning and delicate, foundations sprung to lilacs.
Orchards where boughs like roots strike into the sky.
Here I could well devise the journey to nothing,
At night getting down from the wagon by the black barns,
The zenith a point of darkness, breaking to bits,
Showering motionless stars over the houses.
Scenes relentless—the black and white grooves of a woodcut.
But why the journey to nothing or any desire?
Why the heart taken by even senseless adventure,
The goal a coffer of dust? Give my mouth to the air,
Let arrogant pain lick my flesh with a tongue
Rough as a cat’s; remember the smell of cold mornings,
The dried beauty of women, the exquisite skin
Under the chins of young girls, young men’s rough beards,—
The cringing promise of this one, that one’s apology
For the knife struck down to the bone, gladioli in sick rooms,
Asters and dahlias, flowers like ruches, rosettes. . .
Forever enough to part grass over the stones
By some brook or well, the lovely seed-shedding stalks;
To hear in the single wind diverse branches
Repeating their sounds to the sky—that sky like scaled mackerel,
Fleeing the fields—to be defended from silence,
To feel my body as arid, as safe as a twig
Broken away from whatever growth could snare it
Up to a spring, or hold it softly in summer
Or beat it under in snow.
I must get well.
Walk on strong legs, leap the hurdles of sense,
Reason again, come back to my old patchwork logic,
Addition, subtraction, money, clothes, clocks,
Memories (freesias, smelling slightly of snow and of flesh
In a room with blue curtains) ambition, despair.
I must feel again who had given feeling over,
Challenge laughter, take tears, play the piano,
Form judgments, blame a crude world for disaster.
To escape is nothing. Not to escape is nothing.
The farmer’s wife stands with a halo of darkness
Rounding her head. Water drips in the kitchen
Tapping the sink. To-day the maples have split
Limb from the trunk with the ice, a fresh wooden wound.
The vines are distorted with ice, ice burdens the breaking
Roofs I have told you of.
Fifteenth Farewell
I
You may have all things from me, save my breath,
The slight life in my throat will not give pause
For your love, nor your loss, nor any cause.
Shall I be made a panderer to death,
Dig the green ground for darkness underneath,
Let the dust serve me, covering all that was
With all that will be? Better, from time’s claws,
The hardened face under the subtle wreath.
Cooler than stones in wells, sweeter, more kind
Than hot, perfidious words, my breathing moves
Close to my plunging blood. Be strong, and hang
Unriven mist over my breast and mind,
My breath! We shall forget the heart that loves,
Though in my body beat its blade, and its fang.
II
I erred, when I thought loneliness the wide
Scent of mown grass over forsaken fields,
Or any shadow isolation yields.
Loneliness was the heart within your side.
Your thought, beyond my touch, was tilted air
Ringed with as many borders as the wind.
How could I judge you gentle or unkind
When all bright flying space was in your care?
Now that I leave you, I shall be made lonely
By simple empty days, never that chill
Resonant heart to strike between my arms
Again, as though distraught for distance,–only
Levels of evening, now, behind a hill,
Or a late cock-crow from the darkening farms.
My Voice Not Being Proud
My voice, not being proud
Like a strong woman’s, that cries
Imperiously aloud
That death disarm her, lull her—
Screams for no mourning color
Laid menacingly, like fire,
Over my long desire.
It will end, and leave no print.
As you lie, I shall lie:
Separate, eased, and cured.
Whatever is wasted or wanted
In this country of glass and flint
Some garden will use, once planted.
As you lie alone, I shall lie,
O, in singleness assured,
Deafened by mire and lime.
I remember, while there is time.
Song
Love me because I am lost;
Love me that I am undone.
That is brave,—no man has wished it,
Not one.
Be strong, to look on my heart
As others look on my face.
Love me,—I tell you that it is a ravaged
Terrible place.
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