2021年的杜甫
当代的一些诗人，也就是些鹦鹉吧，
在争啄那几粒稻米。
而从我童年的那棵大树上，
有凤凰飞来。
布莱希特
“不要往墙上钉钉子”
——布莱希特如是说。
可是我们已往墙上钉了那么多，
除了一些黑洞
什么也没有挂上。
维米尔的小女孩
维米尔的小女孩，有那么多诗人
赞美你耳垂下的那颗珍珠，
但对我来说，它的美，
它所凝聚的光和
重量，其实是一颗泪珠。
茨维塔耶娃
你死于远离莫斯科的小城叶拉布加，
可是你仍在捷克的山谷间游荡。
你的诗，鸟儿也会背诵。
而现在，你累了，你想坐下来抽一支烟，
你能否找到一个可以借火的人？
重读《古拉格群岛》
铁蒺藜、编号、高音喇叭、探照灯……
多年前读《古拉格群岛》，
最吸引我的，就是那些囚犯逃跑的故事；
似乎索尔仁尼琴写下这些，
就是为了让人们逃跑。
现在我们还跑吗？还在跑。
现在我们还跑吗？不跑了。
（2021）
From “Marginalia，” five Fragments
Du Fu in 2021
Some contemporary poets are just parrots
fighting over a few grains of rice.
And from the great tree of my childhood,
a phoenix is coming.
Bertolt Brecht
“Don’t go driving nails into the wall!”
—Brecht said so.
But we’ve already driven so many nails into the wall;
aside from some black holes,
nothing else is hanging.
Vermeer’s Little Girl
Vermeer’s little girl. So many poets
praise the pearl’s beauty hanging from your ear,
but for me, its beauty,
coalescing light and
weight, is that it’s a tear.
Tsvetaeva
You died in the small town of Yelabuga,
but you’re still wandering valleys of the Czech Republic.
Even the birds can recite your poems.
And now you’re tired and want to sit down and smoke a cigarette.
Can you find someone to lend you a light?
Rereading The Gulag Archipelago
Barbed wire, numbers, loudspeakers, searchlights—
years ago, reading The Gulag Archipelago,
what drew me in was the story of prisoners escaping;
it seems Solzhenitsyn wrote this
just to make people run.
Are we still running now? Yes, still running.
Are we still running now? No, no more running.
（2021）
——Translated by Arthur Sze
“悲伤时代的伟大诗人”
——致哈尔科夫诗人谢尔希·扎丹*
悲伤时代的伟大诗人，
谈论着希望，
是为了使他们的防线不至于崩溃。
他也不会放下他的诗，至少
他可以向一只飞落在战壕边的黑色画眉
交流歌唱的技艺。
2022，5
*谢尔希·扎丹(Serhiy Zhadan)，乌克兰著名当代诗人，生活在哈尔科夫，曾写有"The Great Poet of Sad Times" 一诗。
“The Great Poets in Sad Times”
-- for the Kharkiv poet Serhiy Zhadan*
The great poets in sad times
Talk of hope
To keep their lines of defense from collapsing.
Nor does he give up his poetry, at least
He could share the art of song
With the darkling thrush alighted beside the trenches.
May 2022
*Serhiy Zhadan is a well-known contemporary Ukrainian poet and writer. He lives in Kharkiv and wrote a poem titled, “The Great Poet in Sad Times”.
——Translated by John Balcom
从阿赫玛托娃的窗口
在彼得堡，
在阿赫玛托娃纪念馆，
在这座被称为“喷泉屋”的四层楼上，
仿佛穿过“地狱”的第四圈，来到一个半坡上回望——
我看着窗外这个可疑的带风景的花园，
我看到树林间掩映着一个鸟身女妖，
我看到受难的母亲，倔犟的儿子，被枪托推倒在地的父亲，
我看到一场葬礼在树梢融化；
我看到我前世的情人仍坐在长椅上发呆，
我看到人们又在树干上张贴诗歌海报；
我看到从这里出去的人，一个个在胸前划着十字，
我看到玛丽娜深陷的大眼睛，在朝我凝望；
我看到几个探头探脑的人，仍躲在树丛后，
衣兜里露出了报话器；
我看到一只黑鸟在草地上蹦跳，接着是另一只；
我看到花园一角的那堆雪，多少年了，还未融化。
我看到死魂灵们仍在鞭打自己。
我看到树上的夏天和即将来临的金色秋天。
我看到了春天草地上最悲痛的环舞。
我看着这一切，“仿佛我在重新告别
那在多年前我已告别的一切。”
我看着这一切，仿佛睁眼看着一个梦。
我看着它，我感到在我右肩的背后
还有一个人和我一起眺望，
因为我盘旋而上，在一个时间之塔上
站在了阿赫玛托娃的窗口。
2016，7，圣彼得堡
At Akhmatova’s Window
In St Petersburg
At the Anna Akhmatova Museum,
On the fourth floor of the “Fountain House”，
As if traversing the fourth circle of hell,
and at mid-slope looking back--
I look out the window at the garden with its unlikely scenery,
I see a mythic harpy partially hidden among the trees,
I see a suffering mother, a defiant son, and a father
knocked to the ground with the butt of a gun,
I see a funeral melt amid the tree branches;
I see a lover from a past life still sitting dazed on a bench,
I see people papering the tree trunks with poetry;
I see people leaving, each making the sign of the cross,
I see Marina’s large sunken eyes staring at me;
I see people stealthily peeking from behind the trees,
Microphones in their pockets;
I see a blackbird hopping on the grass, followed by another;
I see the snow piled in one corner of the garden,
still unmelted after so many years.
I see spirits of the dead still flagellating themselves.
I see summer in the trees and the approaching gold of autumn.
I see the most sorrowful circular dance on spring grass.
I see all of this, “as if bidding farewell again
To what I parted from long ago.”*
I see it all, as if dreaming with my eyes wide open.
I see it, I feel someone behind me at my right shoulder，
Together with me, gazing into the distance
Because I climbed the tower of time, spiraling upward
To stand at Akhmatova’s window.
July 2016，St. Petersburg
*Quoted from the “Introduction” of Akhmatova’s long poem “Poem without a Hero” written in her later years. (translation by Judith Hemschemeyer).
——Translated by John Balcom
