R. S.托马斯（Ronald Stuart Thomas），威尔士诗坛泰斗，20世纪英语世界最伟大的抒情诗人和宗教诗人之一。他的诗歌创作大致可分为两个阶段，七十年代前的诗作主要是关于威尔士的乡民与风光、历史与文化，以及他们自己做牧师的体验。从七十年代起诗人与“隐身上帝”的对话，探索人类内在的精神世界，因此他又有当代最伟大的宗教诗人之称。托马斯著有诗集20余部，多次获得各种诗歌奖项和荣誉，包括英女王诗歌金奖（1964），并于1996年获正式提名诺贝尔文学奖。托马斯终身在威尔士偏远的乡村教堂当牧师，自觉以自然和乡村的宁静、质朴来对抗现代世界的喧嚣与虚华。他的诗跟他本人一样，严谨拙朴，冷峻肃穆，厚重深刻。
致一位年轻诗人
在教堂
我常常试图
分析它沉默的
品质。上帝就是藏在这里
躲避我搜寻吗？我停下来倾听，
在少数人离去后，
聆听空气为守夜重新编排
自己。自从石头聚集在它周围
它就一直这样等待着。
这些是一个躯体坚硬
的肋骨，我们的祈祷也没能
将其激活。阴影从它们的
角落走出来，占据了
光照耀一小时
的地方。蝙蝠们继续
它们的活动。长椅上的不安
停止了。没有别的声响
黑暗中除了一个人呼吸的
声音，在虚空上检验
他的信心，把他的问题
一个接一个钉在无人的十字架上。
In Church
Often I try
To analyse the quality
Of its silences. Is this where God hides
From my searching? I have stopped to listen,
After the few people have gone,
To the air recomposing itself
For vigil. It has waited like this
Since the stones grouped themselves about it.
These are the hard ribs
Of a body that our prayers have failed
To animate. Shadows advance
From their corners to take possession
Of places the light held
For an hour. The bats resume
Their business. The uneasiness of the pews
Ceases. There is no other sound
In the darkness but the sound of a man
Breathing, testing his faith
On emptiness, nailing his questions
One by one to an untenanted cross.
未出生的女儿
在她未出生的浩渺人海
我们有限生命的同心圆；
在她未出生时，她的名字在脑海里
像一棵幼小的蕨类植物一样舒展；
在子宫的黑暗中，对她赤裸的
肉体和美丽，我赋予
意志的正规影响，
不屈的心灵的影响，
在她流动的骨骼上编织
她存在的微妙结构，她的
头发，手和眼睛，身体的肌理，
散发着灵魂的光辉。
The Unborn Daughter
On her unborn in the vast circle
Concentric with our finite lives;
On her unborn, her name uncurling
Like a young fern within the mind;
On her unclothed with flesh or beauty
In the womb’s darkness, I bestow
The formal influence of the will,
The wayward influence of the heart,
Weaving upon her fluid bones
The subtle fabric of her being,
Hair, hands and eyes the body’s texture,
Shot with the glory of the soul.
它的方式
她用手指把颜料
变成花朵，用她的身体
把花朵变成对自己
的回忆。她总是在
工作，缝补我们婚姻
的外衣，像鸟儿
一样觅食给
我们找吃的。如果我的生命中
有荆棘，那会是她
用胸膛贴着荆棘歌唱。
当她要责骂时，她的话，
太尖刻了，之后她忙了
好几个小时把微笑
揉进伤口。当我年轻时，
看到她，本能地展开
羽毛的盛装
去吸引她。她没有受骗，
但接受了我，就像一个女孩
在没有爱情的
薄月下，把我当作一个
可以和她一起建立家庭的人
为她想象中的孩子。
The Way of it
With her fingers she turns paint
into flowers, with her body
flowers into a remembrance
of herself, she is at work
always, mending the garment
of our marriage, foraging
like a bird for something
for us to eat. If there are thorns
in my life, its is she who
will press her breast to them and sing.
Her words, when she would scold,
are too sharp. She is busy
after for hours rubbing smiles
into the wounds. I saw her,
when young, and spread the panoply
of my feathers instinctively
to engage her. She was not deceived,
but accepted me as a girl
will under a thin moon
in love’s absence as someone
she could build a home with
for her imagined child.
一位老妇人
她的日子用一桶桶的水来计量，
从水泵里抽出，而在杯中冲泡的滴滴
无奶茶，记录着时光的流逝。
然而，无论是茶，还是几片红花瓣
垂在炉膛里的，火苗的跳动，
都不能阻止她血管里的冰形成，
使血凝固，使清澈的蓝眼睛蒙上阴影。
夜深人静时，她坐在那张嘲弄她
脆弱骨头的椅子上，凝视着
铅框窗外的月亮，
那琥珀色的蛇在吞着一枚蛋；
她听不见脚步声，当好奇的孩子们
聚集在傍晚，她再也看不见
树篱中绽放的一张张面孔，
随着年龄增长，视力变弱，耳膜僵硬。
但是，如果邻居们唤她，她就靠上去攫取
他们忙碌的嘴唇上闲话的碎屑，
像只伶俐的小鸟，不时地笑，
一种高分贝、尖锐的、不畅快的笑，半咳，半鸣，
跑调，干巴，一如吹过蓟花的东风。
An Old Woman
Her days are measured out in pails of water,
Drawn from the pump, while drops of milkless tea,
Brewed in the cup, record the passing hours.
Yet neither tea nor beat of the small fire,
Its few red petals drooping in the grate，
Can stop the ice that forms within her veins,
And knots the blood and clouds the clear, blue eye.
At edge of night she sits in the one chair,
That mocks the frailness of her bones, and stares
Out of the leaded window at the moon,
That amber serpent swallowing an egg;
Footsteps she hears not, and no longer sees
The crop of faces blooming in the hedge
When curious children cluster in the dusk,
Vision being weak and ear-drums stiff with age.
And yet if neighbours call she leans and snatches
The crumbs of gossip from their busy lips,
Sharp as a bird, and now and then she laughs，
A high, shrill, mirthless laugh, half cough, half whistle,
Tuneless and dry as east wind through a thistle.
差距
上帝醒了，但噩梦
并没有退去。逐字逐句
语言之塔越来越高。
他斜倚在空中
看着它。再多说一个字
就可以和他平起
平坐了；词汇
会胜出。他
用思想量了量
这条狭缝。不，不，不，
比那宽些！但那接近的感觉
持续着。如何接受
事实，是现在的
壮举。如何在一个字
就能跨越的鸿沟
边缘休息。
他俯下身
查看他们用的
字典。他的名字旁仍有
空白和他们之间的
领域有相同
顺序，那是语言渴望
自在之物。黑暗
是一个神（注）的血液在他体内
膨胀，他让它
在纸页的空白处
作记号，那是用所有语言
和不用语言；这是语法学家的
折磨和细胞核的
奥秘，而无法得出的
等式，就是
这窄距，我们凝
视的永恒的
寂静，那上帝的休息。
The Gap
God woke, but the nightmare
did not recede. Word by word
the tower of speech grew.
He looked at it from the air
he reclined on. One word more and
it would be on a level
with him; vocabulary
would have triumphed. He
measured the thin gap
with his mind. No,no,no,
wider than that! But the nearness
persisted. How to live with
the fact, that was the feat
now. How to take his rest
on the edge of a chasm a
word could bridge.
He leaned
over and looked in the dictionary
they used. There was the blank still
by his name of the same
order as the territory
between them, the verbal hunger
for the thing in itself. And the darkness
that is a god's blood swelled
in him, and he let it
to make the sign in the space
on the page, that is in all languages
and none; that is the grammarian's
torment and the mystery
at the cell's core, and the equation
that will not come out, and is
the narrowness that we stare
over into the eternal
silence that is the repose of God.
循环
一个人扔掉刷下的东西。
一只鹪鹩发现了它们，并在里面筑巢。
一只老鼠发现了刚孵出的幼崽。
老鼠来，偷了这人的面包，
现在躺在那里，一个装蛆的食橱。
是人最先行动和走最后一步。
他把东西扔掉，它们又回到他那。
他寻找那常退去的
回来发现它们在等他。
他离开了上帝
把自己像垃圾一样丢弃。
但梦想找到了他，建立在他心中，
然后死亡来了，吞噬梦想者的
雏窝。依然死亡是从一个人
身上生出来；如此死前
有人，死后
有更多人，而梦比死亡
持久，做梦的人永远不死。
Circles
A man threw some brushings away.
A wren found them and built in them.
A rat found the young when they were hatched.
The rat came, stealing the man's bread,
And lies now, a cupboard for maggots.
It is man makes the first move and the last.
He throws things away and they return to him.
He seeks things that always withdraw
And finds them waiting on his return.
He takes his departure from God
And is as trash thrown away.
But a dream finds him and builds in him,
And death comes and eats up the dreamer's
Brood. And still it is out of a man
Death is born; so before death
Man is, and after death
There is more man, and the dream outlasts
Death, and the dreamer will never die.
遇见这一家
约翰一号在桌上占据了他的位置，
他是寓言的第一部分；
他的眼睛干得像一片枯叶。
看着他，学会悲伤。
约翰二号站在门口
一声不吭；你以前见过那张脸
从黑暗的过去中探出来，
受着思想的痛苦冲击波的折磨。
约翰三号还在外面
流口水，那里日光消失
在湿漉漉的石头上；他的双手交叉
哀悼着失去的玩伴。
约翰·奥尔和他瘦弱的妻子，
她的被迫合谋给了
每个讨厌的胎儿生命，从墙上注视着，
死神没有缺席。夜幕降临。
译者注：第四节“John All”按名字音译，“All”的意思是全部，在诗中理解为老约翰。
Meet the family
John One takes his place at the table,
He is the first part of the fable;
His eyes are dry as a dead leaf.
Look on him and learn grief.
John Two stands in the door
Dumb; you have seen that face before
Leaning out of the dark past,
Tortured in thought’s bitter blast.
John Three is still outside
Drooling where the daylight died
On the wet stones; his hands are crossed
In mourning for a playmate lost.
John All and his lean wife,
Whose forced complicity gave life
To each loathed foetus, stare from the wall,
Dead not absent. The night falls.
未寄出的
亲爱的不相识的朋友，
为什么把你的诗寄给我？
我们是兄弟，我承认；
但是它们不好。
我明白你为什么要写，
但为什么要寄出去？为什么不
埋了它们，像猫埋粪便一样？
你混淆了慈善和艺术。
它们的主张不同，
虽然任何一个的缺失
散发的味道差不多。
我用下我的想象力：
我看到一只抽筋的手握着
一支弯曲的笔，或者，更糟，
你写字时用的是脚。
你在铁床上等着
我的答复。我的信
可以是一袋金子，
你用来付你的路费，越过
巨人，绝望。
我降低我的标准
并让真相直击我的
双眼之间。“这些都是伟大的
诗篇，”我写着，看到天堂的
贫民窟破布横飞，
瘸子挥舞着他们的拐杖，
还有这个，不通韵律之人，
他知道慈善短缺
而这首诗永远，用所有温柔
忍受着我黑暗的谎言，
就像圆月忍受月蚀一样。
Unposted
Dear friend unknown,
why send me your poems?
We are brothers,I admit;
but they are no good.
I see why you wrote them,
but why send them? Why not
bury them,as a cat its faeces?
You confuse charity and art.
They have not equal claims,
though the absence of either
will smell more or less the same.
I use my imagination:
I see a cramped hand gripping
a bent pen, or, worse perhaps,
it was with your foot you wrote.
You wait in an iron bed
for my reply. My letter
could be the purse of gold
you pay your way with past
the giant, Despair.
I lower my standards
and let truth hit me squarely
between the eyes. 'These are great
poems,' I write,and see heaven's
slums with their rags flying,
cripples brandishing their crutches,
and the one,innocent of scansion,
who knows charity is short
and the poem for ever,suffering
my dark lie with all the blandness
with which the round moon suffers an eclipse.
埃文斯
埃文斯？是的，很多时候
我从他光秃的楼梯上
下来，走进破旧的烧着
柴火的厨房，蟋蟀鸣叫
合奏黑水壶的
哀鸣，就这样进入寒冷的
黑暗令人窒息的浓厚
夜潮中，那夜潮漂浮在山脊
他的荒凉农场的墙壁上。
不是充满了我的眼和嘴的
黑暗使我惊骇；甚至不是雨
像血从一棵饱经风霜的树
滴落。是那淤塞了
我离开的病人血管的黑暗
他搁浅在凄凉的床
的广阔而孤独的海岸。
Evans
Evans? Yes, many a time
I came down his bare flight
Of stairs into the gaunt kitchen
With its wood fire, where crickets sang
Accompaniment to the black kettle’s
Whine, and so into the cold
Dark to smother in the thick tide
Of night that drifted about the walls
Of his stark farm on the hill ridge.
It was not the dark filling my eyes
And mouth appalled me; not even the drip
Of rain like blood from the one tree
Weather-tortured. It was the dark
Silting the veins of that sick man
I left stranded upon the vast
多数情况下这是
以放弃他们
为之奋斗的价值观
为借口的战争。其间
他们为下一场
制定了计划，合约
被机器的迫切情况
免除。沉默
已过时了；智慧存在于
对精神的严格规范
的修订中。继续前进
是最好的；让到达
更接近启程；与掌声
同步，当公众形象
上下静止的
飞机时。多年的劳作
结束了；孩子们是瞬间
存在的继承人。他们喂给机器
他们的问题，明知
答案，却不能应用它们。
Digest
Mostly it was wars
With their justification
Of the surrender of values
For which they fought. Between
Them they laid their plans
For the next, exempted
From compact by the machine’s
Exigencies. Silence
Was out of date; wisdom consisted
In a revision of the strict code
Of the spirit. To keep moving
Was best; to bring the arrival
Nearer departure; to synchronise
The applause, as the public images
Stepped on and off the stationary
Aircraft. The labour of the years
Was over; the children were heirs
To an instant existence. They fed the machine
Their questions, knowing the answers
Already, unable to apply them.
有一朵花在风中
一只手摘下了它。
有一条小溪在流动
一个身体弄脏了它。
有一面纯净的水
的镜子，一张脸来
照在里面。有言语，
战争，契约，有践踏的
脚，车轮在上面
烙印；和紧随其后的
爆炸。有尘土飞扬
和寂静无声；从尘土中
长出一株植物，露水结在
上面；小溪从露水中
渗出，形成
一面镜子，镜子是空的。
Gone
There was a flower blowing
And a hand plucked it.
There was a stream flowing
And a body smirched it.
There was a pure mirror
Of water and a face came
And looked in it. There were words
And wars and treaties, and feet trampled
The earth and the wheels
Seared it; and an explosion
Followed. There was dust
And silence; and out of the dust
A plant grew, and the dew formed
Upon it; and a stream seeped
From the dew to construct
A mirror, and the mirror was empty.
离开只是到自我
的边界。还是待在这好，
我说，保持视野
清晰。最好的旅程
是向内走。是内心
在呼唤。艾略特听到了。
华兹华斯从北部
的群山转向自己思想
的悬崖，让自己
下去寻找搁浅在光秃
岩架上的诗歌。
对有些人
这全是黑暗；对我，也
是黑暗的。但那里有我
可以握住的手，听到的声音
比外面的回声更
可靠。有时会有一种奇异的光
照耀着，比月亮更纯净，
没有阴影，那就是
为真理而死的先驱们
的骨头上的光环。
Groping
Moving away is only to the boundaries
of the self. Better to stay here,
I said, leaving the horizons
clear. The best journey to make
is inward. It is the interior
that calls. Eliot heard it.
Wordsworth turned from the great hills
of the north to the precipice
of his own mind, and let himself
down for the poetry stranded
on the bare ledges.
For some
it is all darkness; for me, too,
it is dark. But there are hands
there I can take, voices to hear
solider than the echoes
without. And sometimes a strange light
shines, purer than the moon,
casting no shadow, that is
the halo upon the bones
of the pioneers who died for truth.
我想他坐在爱丁顿那张
奇怪的桌子旁（注），那根本不是
一张桌子，而是结点和分子
推动着分子和
结点；他在那用看不见的
笔迹写下了基因遵循的
指令。我想象他的
脸更像是一只钟
的脸，它所显示的时间
是现在，虽然提到了
希腊，埃及和其他帝国
还没有开始。
我想我会有
话对在审判的
上帝说，冲他大喊，
像约伯那样，用一颗被虐待
的心的雄辩（注）。但是不会有
任何评判，除了他计算
的结果，那深奥的
几何学永远在超越
At It
and nodes; and he writes there
in invisible handwriting the instructions
the genes follow. I imagine his
face that is more the face
of a clock, and the time told by it
is now, though Greece is referred
to and Egypt and empires
not yet begun.
And I would have
things to say to this God
at the judgement, storming at him,
as job stormed, with the eloquence
of the abused heart. But there will be
no judgement other than the verdict
of his calculations, that abstruse
geometry that proceeds eternally
in the silence beyond right and wrong.
R.S.托马斯与妻子爱尔西（Elsi）
1913年，R.S.托马斯出生于威尔士的首府卡迪夫，是父母的独子。
1929年，托马斯顺从母亲意愿，进入班戈大学（Bangor University）学习古典文学；
1935年，毕业后前往位于卡迪夫的圣米歇尔神学院进修；
1937年，被正式任命为牧师。被派到威尔士东北部与英格兰交界的丘克（Chirk）做助理牧师时期，结识了米尔德里德·爱尔德里奇（Mildred Eldridge），人称爱尔西（Elsi）；
1940年，结婚（27岁）后，托马斯在附近的汉莫（Hanmer）村担任副牧师；
1942年，托马斯被调往莫那文（Manafon），升职为那里的牧区长。蒙哥马利郡的山区在这期间成了他诗歌中的主要风景，还帮助他建立了诗人的荣誉。
1954年，到威尔士西海岸阿伯里斯特威斯（Aberystwyth）附近的伊格维斯法赫（Eglwys-fach）担任教区牧师。不堪忍受英格兰殖民者渗透的消费主义和市场价值观；
1967年，向西搬到更偏远的利恩半岛（Lleyn）顶端，担任阿伯达伦（Aberdaron）的教区牧师；
1978年，退休（65岁）后，与妻子继续在半岛上居住了十五年，他们的萨恩山庄（Sarn-y-Plas）是位于阿伯达伦附近的一栋具有四百多年历史的小石屋（Plas-yn-Rhiw）。在利恩半岛上托马斯的诗歌创作进入一个新的阶段；
1991年，爱尔西因病去世，托马斯时年78岁。
1995年，已过耋耄之年（82岁）的诗人焕发出一段令人迷惑的夕阳恋情，与同样已过耋耄之年的贝蒂·维农（Betty Vernon）再婚。
2000年，托马斯于2000年9月25日（87岁）因心脏病去世。
译者介绍
Translator's introduction
Mi Lüyi (Amelia Mi), a poet and translator, wrote and edited a collection of poems (Spiritual Practicing of Words) in 2014, published a collection of poems (A Ladder to the Rainbow) in December 2017; The poems translated by Mi Lüi come mainly from Wystan Hugh Auden, Elizabeth Bishop, Czeslaw Milosz, Charles Simic, Louise Glück, and R.S.Thomas, The translated poems are collected in “A Collection of Translated Poetry by Mi Lüyi” edited in December 2018; Winner of the 3rd Pentium Poet Award, lives in Shanghai.
译者介绍：米绿意，写诗及翻译。著自编诗集《字的修行》（2014年），出版诗集《通往彩虹的梯子》（2017年12月）；翻译有查尔斯.西米克、路易丝.格吕克、伊丽莎白.毕肖普、切斯瓦夫.米沃什、W.H.奥登、R.S.托马斯的诗歌作品，编著《米绿意译诗合集》（2018年12月）；获第三届奔腾诗人奖；现居上海。
米绿意诗集购买（请加微信-注明“购买诗集”）：DennisAmia 谢谢支持！
回顾|《敬丹樱 宋憩园 》《查尔斯.西米克 《幽灵》》
