默温诗两首：最初的时光

Merwin, W. S, The shadow of Sirius (Tarset: Bloodaxe, 2009)， 76-77.

最初的时光

默温

当我自大陆而来
见它在身后合拢
像那失落的本原
多久之后，我才相信
我离它远去。

从我回忆悠长的微光中
正浮现这彼岸世界
晨曦用熟悉的幻象
笼罩了陌生的土地
所有梦境瞬间消逝
遁入阴影，此地空余
那亲切的，曾经亲切的风景。

道路向南敞开，
屋顶从各自的疆域里
依次浮现，确定如
季节更替
翠绿鹅黄的田野之外
更有如年岁递进的群山
棕红的牛在坡上
羊群云一般漂移。

还有日暮时的家门
一把古老的动词在锁里转动
还有冷石的芬芳，一如既往
门退入黑暗的静默
不回答，也不遗忘
还有不变的惊讶
永未被驯服或命名
或置于掌握
更不曾完全得见
但它依然如是
抵御新闻的景象梦中
得以飞翔的恩赐
在梦澄澈的深度我窥见
遥不可及处闪亮的日子
那里造就了现在的我。

The First Days

W. S. Merwin

As I come from a continent
that I saw closing behind me
like a lost element
day after day before
I believed I was leaving it

here surfacing through the long
backlight of my recollection
is this other world veiled
in its illusion of being known
at the moment of daybreak
when the dreams all at once are gone
into shadow leaving only
in their place the familiar
once-familiar landscape

with its road open to the south
the roofs emerging on the way
from their own orbits according
to an order as certain
as the seasons
the fields emerald and mustard
and beyond them the precession
of hills with red cows on the slopes
and then the edging clouds of sheep

and the house door at evening
one old verb in the lock turning
and the fragrance of cold stone as once more
the door cedes in a dark hush
that neither answers nor forgets
and an unchanged astonishment
that has never been tamed nor named
nor held in the hand
nor ever fully seen
but it is still the same
a vision before news a gift
of flight in a dream
of clear depths where I glimpse
far out of reach the lucent days
from which now I am made

无独有偶，此前译过一首土耳其诗人学者Hulki Aktunç的《最初的时光》。原标题Evail，土耳其语里一般用的词是evvel，根据两同文堂主的解答，从词根来讲是阿拉伯语awwal的复数。اول Awwal是“第一、最初”，اوايل。我的土语不好，请不吝指正。

Hulki Aktunç, Twelfth Song (Dublin: Poetry Ireland Ltd/Éigse Éireann, 1998), 20-21

Evail

Yürüme arası durma arası bakma arası.
Burda boyun şurda adım orda karanlık.

Merdivenin en eskı öncüleri tedirgin
Gözlüyor taşlığı. Aksıyor bebe arabası.

Çıkrık ağlıyor. Gülüyor kapı kolları.
Sarnıç mı üleştiren eve karaltıları?

Arabı ay rumi hicran hicri çarkıfelek.
Temelleri inliyor eskiden gidenlerin.

Menteşe düştü, köreldi yalın kapı. Gelenler
Hurçlarını denklerini açtıkça kapandı kapı.

最初的时光

行走间停留间注视间。
脖颈在这步履在那黑暗更远。

楼梯上最初的开拓者不安地
盯着庭院。婴儿车在后蹒跚。

绞盘呜咽，门把手低笑。
是水窖在屋里散布黑暗吗？

阿拉伯、希腊或圣历，分离是
我们的命运。先离去者的根基在悲吟。

铰链锈蚀了，门板依然沉重，更多人到来
卸下重担，打开包裹，关上门。