Moving Repeatedly

By Bai Hua

I'm walking on the carpet, you walking on a lie.
Is it said by Chekhov? Please ask the Germans

Dinner, always served with the same cold meat sliced
It's better to blame the cook than blame the meat

Your sleep talking: "Popes pounced on poplars,"
my words awake, poets crooned a Yunnanese song...

Someone just has vertigo is really scary when he breaks in!
"Moving,  a second, a third – only find some refuge at last."

September 12, 2017/ translated by Chen Zihong

Line 8, the original Nabokov's writing in the book Letters to Véra (English version by Penguin Books Ltd,  translated and edited by Olga Voronina and Brian Boyd) is: ...move to another place, to a second, a third – only find some refuge at last.  -Tr.

This poem just sellected from Bai Hua's Poems: Stories of Nabokov (10 poems) -Tr.

反复搬

柏桦

我走在地毯上，你走在谎言上。
这是契诃夫说的吗？问德国人

晚餐，总是千篇一律的冷切肉
你责备肉，还不如责备烧肉人

梦里，你说“教皇猛击白杨树”，
醒来，我说，诗人低唱云南风……

有眩晕症的人闯进来很可怕！
“反复搬，直到找到一个藏身处。”

注释一：“教皇猛击白杨树”，见纳博科夫：《致薇拉》，人民文学出版社，第115页。
注释二：“反复搬，直到找到一个藏身处。”见同上，第101页。

2017年9月12日

（选自《纳博科夫的故事（十首）》第五首）