双语·《西尔维娅·普拉斯诗集》 郁金香

Tulips
郁金香

The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here.
时逢冬天，郁金香却太艳丽。

Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in.
瞧，一切被雪覆盖，雪白，多安静。

I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly
我正在适应这宁静，独自安静地躺着

As the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands.
光线散落在白色墙上，床上和双手上。

I am nobody;I have nothing to do with explosions.
我是小人物；我与突然冒出的艳丽无关。

I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses
我已把我的名字、白天穿的衣服交给了护士

And my history to the anesthetist and my body to surgeons.
我的历史给了麻醉师，我的身体给了外科医生。

They have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff
他们将我的头支撑好，在枕头与床单之间

Like an eye between two white lids that will not shut.
仿佛一只眼，嵌在两层白色眼皮间。

Stupid pupil, it has to take everything in.
愚蠢的眼球，必须将这一切收入眼中。

The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble,
护士们来来去去，她们并不找我麻烦。

They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps,
她们带着白色帽子，与海鸥经过海岛一样，

Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another,
双手忙碌着，一个与另一个相同，

So it is impossible to tell how many there are.
因此不可能知道她们有几个。

My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water
我的身体如鹅卵石，她们处理它

Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently.
仿佛水轻柔地、冲刷滑过鹅卵石。

They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep.
她们用铮亮的针给我麻醉，带我入睡。

Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage——
我已迷失自己，我厌倦这个行李——

My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox,
我的漆皮手提箱像黑色的药片盒，

My husband and child smiling out of the family photo;
家庭照片中丈夫和孩子冲我微笑；

Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks.
他们的微笑抓住我的皮肤，微笑的小钩子。

I have let things slip, a thirty-year-old cargo boat
我已让它们溜走，三十年的老货船

Stubbornly hanging on to my name and address.
顽固地挂着我的名字和地址。

They have swabbed me clear of my loving associations.
它们已清除了我充满爱意的联想。

Scared and bare on the green plastic-pillowed trolley
赤裸躺在铺有绿色塑料垫子的推车上，我害怕

I watched my teaset, my bureaus of linen, my books
我看着我的茶具、铺着亚麻布的书桌，我的书

Sink out of sight, and the water went over my head.
退出视线，而那水从我的头流过。

I am a nun now, I have never been so pure.
现在我是修女，我从未如此纯洁。

I didn’t want any flowers, I only wanted
我并不要什么花，我只想

To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.
躺着毫无牵挂，双手朝上放好。

How free it is, you have no idea how free——
多么自由，你真想不到多么自由——

The peacefulness is so big it dazes you,
如此的宁静让你恍惚不安，

And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets.
而它不求什么，不求姓名牌，或小饰品。

It is what the dead close on,finally;I imagine them
最终，死者在逼近；我想象它们

Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet.
正闭上它们的嘴，像一个圣餐薄饼。

The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me.
郁金香从一开始就太红艳，它们伤害我。

Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe
即使透过礼品包装纸，我仍听见它们轻柔的

Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby.
呼吸，像难受的婴儿，透过白色的襁褓纸。

Their redness talks to my wound, it corresponds.
红色对着我的伤口说话，伤口附和着。

They are subtle:they seem to float, though they weigh me down,
它们很巧妙：它们似在漂浮，却使我沉重，

Upsetting me with their sudden tongues and their color,
它们突然闯入，舌状花瓣和颜色使我不安，

A dozen red lead sinkers round my neck.
仿佛一打红色铅锚绕着我的脖子下沉。

Nobody watched me before, now I am watched.
从未有人注意过我，而现在，有人看护我。

The tulips turn to me, and the window behind me
郁金香转向我，而我身后的窗户

Where once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins,
每天一次光线缓慢变宽又缓慢变细，

And I see myself,flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadow
我发觉自己，扁平、可笑，剪纸的影子

Between the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips,
在太阳之眼和郁金香的眼睛之间，

And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself.
但我没有脸，我已经将自己抹去。

The vivid tulips eat my oxygen.
鲜活的郁金香吞食我的氧气。

Before they came the air was calm enough,
郁金香送来之前空气很安静，

Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss.
流动着，我一口接一口地呼吸，没有忙乱。

Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise.
后来郁金香像大声的噪音填满了空气。

Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river
现在空气缠住它们并围绕着它们旋转

Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine.
如同河水缠住围绕下沉的锈红色引擎。

They concentrate my attention, that was happy
它们吸引我的注意力，那样快乐地

Playing and resting without committing itself.
玩耍、休息，并没有承担任何义务。

The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves.
那些墙，似乎，也在温暖它们自己。

The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals;
郁金香应该关在笼子里，危险的动物；

They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat,
它们却盛开仿佛某只非洲巨猫张开的嘴，

And I am aware of my heart:it opens and closes
而我意识到我的心脏：张开又关闭

Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me.
红色的心房涌出我纯粹的爱。

The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea,
我尝到的水温暖带咸味，仿佛大海，

And comes from a country far away as health.
从陌生的国度涌来，遥远如我的健康。

(1961/03/18. pp.160—162. No. 142)
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