(3)玛丽 奥利弗之八：散文《天鹅》和诗歌《天鹅》

    

天鹅

        文/玛丽 奥利弗

        译/原野

几年前，我给自己定了三个“规则”。我说，我写的每一首诗，必须有一个真正的主体，它必须有真诚的能量，它必须有一个精神的宗旨。如果我心中的诗没有任何其中之一，它该被斥责和重写，或放弃。在过去的四十多年里，写诗一直是我的主要活动，我有添加其他的忠告和许可。我希望每一首诗的强度“休息”。我希望它和“世界图片”一样丰富，我希望它沿着一条线从感性到知性世界。我希望每一首诗都呈现一个生活充满智慧，耐心，热情，和奇思妙想（不是我的生活 - 不一定 - 而是正式自我的生活，作家的生活）。

我希望诗提出问题，在最佳时刻，我想让这个问题不作回答。我想明确的是，回答这个问题，是读者一边，一个隐含的作者-读者协议的一部分。最后但并非最不重要，我想这首诗有一个脉冲，呼吸，某种尘世喜悦片刻。

（虽然要吸引读者关注其中的重要课题，快乐绝不是不重要的成分。）

“天鹅”拥有部分这些特质。它还有一个“秘密”的幽默，我开始这首诗时，我看鹅不是天鹅时-- 就是，构思这首诗，感觉它的概念，写下了几行。因为我最近才写了一个关于鹅的诗，我以为我会加强这首诗的表现力，使它甚至比我看着大雁这种美丽的鸟的形状更加精美。我认为这相当有趣，并记得，因此具有一种轻松愉悦心境，我进行描述。虽然作为一个读者其实不知情，我不怀疑我的心情恰当地切合我，否则对我的工作 - 我相信它是那样的。

形式没有问题 - 短行的长句，一点点联系让事情进展（天鹅在动态中），但不要太多的联系，这样每行，像天鹅的行动，果断，并保持自己的尊严。去掉一些逗号，使之平滑，因为几乎宇宙中的每一首诗，都动作太慢。然后，一旦的“实际”（字）到位，着手解决为什么占有读者的宝贵时间 - 邀请读者渴望要做并不仅仅享受美的东西，并将根据他或她自己可能的想法配置。确保在诗中没有任何东西让读者成为诗的传声筒。而且，就这些。最后一句 - “触摸岸”---是至关重要的，它是一个结束，但它也是一个时刻的到来，因此，一个可能的新的开始。

读者并不觉得他或她自己一个参与者的诗，是一个讲座，坐在一把不舒服的椅子听，在闷热的房间里，在建筑物内。我的诗都写在 - 如果不是结尾至少开头 - 室外某处：在田野里，岸边，天空下。他们不是讲座。关键在于不是诗人如何感受这个时刻，而是读者会如何感受。如果读者接受，并考虑相关的问题，“天鹅”完成了它的初衷。

天鹅

      文/玛丽 奥利弗

      译/原野

跨过宽阔水域

  有东西漂

    然而至 - 苗条

      而优雅的

船，满载着

  白色花卉---

    而且它在移动

      用其神奇的肌肉

仿佛时间不复存在，

  仿佛带来了这样的礼物

     给干枯堤岸

       是一种几乎

超出了负载的幸福。

  现在转动它的黑眼睛，

    重新理顺着

      它的翅膀云，

跟随其后

  一个精心制作的蹼脚，

    木炭色。

      很快将在这里。

哦，我应该怎么办

  当罂粟色的喙

    躺在我手里？

      诗人布莱克太太说：

我想念我丈夫相伴---

  他常常是这样

    在天堂里。

      当然！天堂之路

不会躺在平坦的英里上。

  它在你对这个

    世界感知的

      想象中，

在你那个

  表示敬意的手势里。

    哦，我将做什么，我会说什么，当那些白色的翅膀

      触岸？

作者简介：

玛丽 奥利弗是美国最广泛阅读当代诗人之一.评论家Alica Ostriker推崇，奥利弗是“像艾默生一样有远见。”她在27岁赢得了来自美国诗社她的第一部诗歌奖，No Voyage是让她获奖的诗集。 在1984年她的诗集American Primitive赢得了普利策奖，并且以诗集New and Selected Poems成为1992年国家图书奖的诗歌得主。她现在是本宁顿学院的教授。

The Swan

Across the wide waters

   something comes

       floating  -- a slim

            and delicate

ship, filled

    with white flowersv---

        and it moves

            on its miraculous muscles

as though time didn't exist,

      as though bringing such gifts

           to the dry shore

                was a happiness

almost beyond bearing.

     And now it turns its dark eyes,

         it arranges

              the  clouds of tis wings,

it trails

    an elaborate webbed foot,

          the color of charcoal.

              Soon it will be here.

Oh, what shall I do

     when that poppy-colored beak

         rests in my hand?

            Said Mrs. Blake of the poet:

I miss my husband's company ---

    he is so often

           in paradise.

                 Of course! the path to heaven

doesn't lie down in flat miles.

     It's in the imagination

         with which you perceive

                 this world,

and the gestures

   with which you honor it.

        Oh, what will I do, what will I say, when those  white wings

            touch the shore?

              

The Swan

Years ago I set three "rules" for myself. Every poem I write, I said, must have a genuine body, it must have sincere energy, and it must have a spiritual purpose. If a poem to my mind failed any one of these categories it was rebuked and redone, or discarded. Over the forty or so years during which writing poems have been my primary activity, I have add other admonitions and consents. I want every poem to "rest" in intensity. I want it to be rich with "pictures of the world" I want  it to carry threads from the perceptually felt world to the intellectual world. I want it to indicate a life to lived with intelligence, patience, passion, and whimsy (not my life --not necessarily! --but the life of my formal self, the writer).

I want the poem ask something and at its best moments, I want the question to remain unanswered. I want it to be clear that answering the question is the reader's part in an implicit author-reader pact. Last but not least, I want the poem to have a pulse, a breathiness, some moment of earthly delight.

(While one is luring the reader into the enclosure of serious subjects, pleasure is by no means an unimportant ingredient.)

"The Swan" has some of these qualities. It has as well a "secret" humor; I was watching geese not swans when I began the poem -- that is, thought of the poem, felt it in concept, and wrote down a few lines. Since I had only recently written a poem about geese, I thought I would intensify the poem's display, and make something even fancier than wild geese out of the beautiful bird shapes I was watching. I thought this fairly funny, and I remember it was therefore with a certain light-hearted pleasure that I proceeded with the description. Though unknown as a fact to the reader, I don't wonder at all if my mood attuned me more finely that otherwise to my work -- I am sure it did.

The form was no problem -- long sentences on short lines, a little enjambment to keep things going ( the swan is in motion) but not too much, so that the lines, like the swan's movement, are decisive, and keep their dignity. Take out some commas, for smoothness and because almost every poem in the universe moves too slowly. Then, once the "actual" is in place (in words), begin to address the reason for taking the reader's good and valuable time -- invite the reader to want to do something beyond merely receiving beauty, and to configure in his or her own mind what that might be. Make sure there is nothing in the poem that would keep the reader form becoming the speaker of the poem. And, that is all. The final phrase -- " touch the shore" --- is vital; it is a closure yet it is also a moment of arrival, and therefore a possible  new beginning.

The poem in which the reader does not feel himself or herself a participant is a lecture, listened to from an uncomfortable chair, in a stuffy room, inside a building. My  poems have all been written -- if not finish at least started -- somewhere out-of-doors: in the fields, on the shore, under the sky. They are not lectures. The point is not what the poet would make of the moment but what the reader would make of it. If the reader accepts and thinks about its question, " The Swan" accomplishes what it set out to do.