祖母的情书

There are no stars tonight

But those of memory.

Yet how much room for memory there is

In the loose girdle of soft rain.

今夜没有星星

却有回忆点点。

而流云柔雨中

能容多少回忆?

There is even room enough

For the letters of my mother’s mother,

Elizabeth,

That have been pressed so long

Into a corner of the roof

That they are brown and soft,

And liable to melt as snow.

原来回忆尽在其中，

连我祖母伊丽莎白的信

也还在，

挤塞在屋顶一角

很久很久。

已经泛黄、柔软，

随时像雪一般融化。

Over the greatness of such space

Steps must be gentle.

It is all hung by an invisible white hair.

It trembles as birch limbs webbing the air.

走进这回忆的圣殿

脚步一定要轻柔。

它全系于一根看不见的白发。

它颤抖着，如桦树枝在网罗空气。

And I ask myself:

我问自己：

"Are your fingers long enough to play

Old keys that are but echoes:

Is the silence strong enough

To carry back the music to its source

And back to you again

As though to her?"

“你的手指是否长到能触及

那古老琴键，带来哪怕只是回音点点：

四周的静寂是否强大到

能把音乐送至其源头

再次传回给你

如同传给她一般?”

Yet I would lead my grandmother by the hand

Through much of what she would not understand;

And so I stumble. And the rain continues on the roof

With such a sound of gently pitying laughter.

而我愿拉着我祖母的手

一起穿越她难以理解的种种;

这一路我跌跌撞撞。而雨继续敲打着屋顶，

发出轻柔怜悯的笑声。