失去

【美】愛麗絲·富爾頓　陳子弘 譯

你感到極端的空虛
占據(jù)了上風(fēng)
而世界化作閃光的
石英，皺縮、翻卷
像租來的電影幕布。
空氣嗡嗡作聲：那
金色風(fēng)扇環(huán)繞圣人頭頂，
電動的并且高懸，
定是從你脊椎升起。
在你嘴唇觸地之前，
你看出這剝離
還想討價還價，懇求上天
寬恕這淪陷，但發(fā)現(xiàn)你自己
被打發(fā)了。迷路

曾是種冒險。孩提時
你與和藹的小姨玩過這游戲，
隨意登上一輛引擎噗哧作響的巴士，不管
其會開往何方。小姨特別留意著
轉(zhuǎn)車，是為了讓你安然
回家。如今她身在何處，
還有她穩(wěn)重冷靜與運(yùn)籌帷幄？
而你的大腦淪為一座污水和垃圾
淹沒掉的拜占庭大教堂。
它的壁畫、記憶和彩紙屑
墜入泥濘的凡塵。
從光線勾勒、骨架分明的穹頂
被禁錮的靈魂俯視著。

你醒來時呆若木雞
像從蘿卜車上掉下來
墜入新黑暗時代。
包裹你雙腿那條石化的河流，
想必是你的裙子。
今天幾月？幾號？醫(yī)生問。
尷尬中，你把厚書一般
重如墓碑的答案拖到嘴邊。
“我不知道，”你低語道。

如果大腦是身體，
你的腦會肌無力
光溜溜站著。
麻木的黏液
蔓延數(shù)個街區(qū)，
而你什么都沒有
除了用一根棉簽
來擦拭一下。
床頭上，他的頭
擱在了光的
盤子上，像一個
裹薄紗紗籠的
苗條姑娘，基督沉入
藍(lán)色長毛絨十字架。
痛苦從未如此不真實(shí)。
英勇卻又是裝飾性的，
他正是我們希望
死亡呈現(xiàn)的模樣。
他多么好地體現(xiàn)了我們
對客套的需求。氧氣
如香檳般美味。你意圖
表達(dá)這昏暗的頓悟。
你想要
縱情狂躁的過往，
但思緒徐徐嘆息像電梯
從一層到另一層。
而詞語……詞語是從水汽結(jié)晶
而成的雪花。

窗外，夕陽
把吸管插入樹木，
啜飲它們的綠意。
這一次你很幸運(yùn)。
你沒失去什么
可說一說的：一種聯(lián)系，一種觀看方式。

回想發(fā)生的一切，你可想象
大腦如拜占庭大教堂一樣，污水塘
和垃圾桶里面的東西充斥這里。
它的壁畫、記憶和彩紙屑
墜入泥濘的凡塵。
從光線勾勒、骨架分明的穹頂
被禁錮的靈魂俯視著。

隨后你拋棄了這洪流，
它曾是一種安慰；放下了
靈魂的泛宗教浪漫。
剩下的——是一種
嚴(yán)格屬于“前任”與“非”的狀態(tài)，
非此、非彼，失去的最高
境界：吞噬一切的虛無
我不得不躲到
第二人稱后面去談?wù)撍?br>仿佛我在談?wù)摿硪粋€

人。我記得母親
把小姨最好的藍(lán)睡衣
疊放在她重癥監(jiān)護(hù)室
梳妝臺的空抽屜里。
若靈魂存在，它不過是
種粘膩的人造絲外殼，
折疊成層層織物時
幾乎會緊縮成虛無。
從健康與自控的高地，我命令她：
“用勁?！彼难鄄€被乙醚麻醉了，
她掙扎著服從。
我緊握住打小起就沒
再握過的手，我想
不顧一切，懇求她醒來。
回來吧，無論你去往何方，
我內(nèi)心的聲音在呼喚。

譯注：
1.小姨，原文aunt是一個廣義的稱謂，可以指父母的姐妹（姑姑、姨媽）或父母兄弟的妻子（伯母、嬸嬸、舅媽）。然而，在描述親戚關(guān)系時，通常默認(rèn)指與自己有血緣關(guān)系的直系親屬，即父母的姐妹。故此處也可以寫為姨媽、姑姑。
2.蘿卜車，原文用的turnip，中文的意思指蕪菁、蘿卜和大頭菜等圓根蔬菜，這個詞在俚語的用法中直接表示愚蠢、白癡、智商有限。
3.痛苦從未如此不真實(shí)（Pain was never so fey）此處fey太多義了，比如有超自然的、妖精般的、注定要死的、古怪的，甚至虛弱的、病態(tài)的等等不一而足，結(jié)合上下文譯者認(rèn)為富爾頓此處強(qiáng)調(diào)的是非真實(shí)性/虛幻性、超脫感以及人工加工的美感。
4.失去的最高境界，原文為the ne plus ultra of losing track，作者在此處直接用了拉丁語短語ne plus ultra，意思是無與倫比、無可超越。

詩人簡介：愛麗絲·富爾頓（Alice Fulton，1952- ）當(dāng)代美國詩人、小說家。她是康奈爾大學(xué)的安·鮑爾斯英語榮休教授，獲得的獎項包括美國藝術(shù)與文學(xué)學(xué)院文學(xué)獎、美國國會圖書館Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt國家獎和Ingram Merrill基金會獎，以及麥克阿瑟獎學(xué)金。

ALICE FULTON

Losing It

You feel a hardcore blankness
gain the upper hand
while the world turns to glittering
silica, crinkles and rolls
up like a rented movie screen.
The air whirrs: surely
the golden fan that halos saints’ heads,
electric and on high,
is rising from your spine.
Before your lips hit the floor
you recognize divestment
and want to dicker, please heaven,
with the slippage, but find yourself
dismissed. Getting lost

was once adventure. As a kid
you and a kindly aunt played at it,
boarding any bus that puffed along, no matter
where it went. Your aunt was mindful
of the transfers, which saw you home
intact. Where is she now
with her calm tokens and cerebral maps?
When your brain’s become a Byzantine cathedral
flooded with the stuff of sump and dumpster.
Its frescoes, memories, confetti
into the mortal sludge.
From domes filleted and bone
with light, the impounded soul looks down.

You wake up dumb
as something fallen off a turnip truck
into a new Dark Age. That petrified
river round your legs must be your skirt.
What month? What day? the doctor asks.
Mortified, you lug the answer, a book
dense as a headstone, to your lips.
“I don’t know,” you whisper.

If brain were body
yours would be unmuscled
and standing in the buff.
The ooze of stupefaction
extends for blocks,
and you have nothing
but a cotton swab
with which to mop it up.
Above the bed, like a sylph
in a filmy sarong,
his head on a plate
of light, Christ sinks
into a blue plush cross.
Pain was never so fey.
Heroic, yet decorative,
he is the way
we wish death to be.
How well he embodies our need
for pleasantry. The oxygen is delicious
as champagne. You wish
to express this dim epiphany.
You'd like to
binge on the fidgety past,
but thoughts sigh slow as elevators
from cell to cell.
And words...words are snow
crystals to be grown from vapor.

Outside, the setting sun
dips a straw into the trees
and drinks their green.
This time you are lucky.
You've lost nothing
to speak of: a contact, a way of seeing.

Thinking back on what happened, you imagine
the brain as Byzantine cathedral, flooded
with the stuff of sump and dumpster.
Its frescoes, memories,
confetti into the mortal
sludge. From domes filleted
|and boned with light, the impounded soul
looks down.

Then you discard the flood,
which was a kind of comfort; let go
the pan-religious romance of the soul.
What's left—a state
that’s strictly ex- and un-,
not-this, not-that, the ne
plus ultra of losing
track: A nothing so engulfing
I had to hide behind
the second person to address it,
as though I spoke of someone

else. I remember my mother
folding my aunt’s best blue pajamas
on the empty drawer of her
dresser in intensive care.
If there’s a soul it’s such
a clingy rayon casing,
deflating almost to absence
when creased in layers of tissue.
From the high ground of health
and self-control, I issued orders to
Try. Her lids, pinned by ether,
strained as she complied.
Squeezing a hand I hadn’t
held since childhood, I wanted to forget
myself and beg her to awaken.
Come back, no matter
where you're headed,
the voice inside me said.

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? from Epoch