政治

【美】鲍勃·佩雷尔曼　陈子弘 译

从前有条线，说了它如何被弯曲。
有人死了而城镇也被命名：
匹兹堡，皮埃蒙特，埃默里维尔。
树种下了，但又被砍倒，
偶然的魔手开枝散叶。
现在，那些药店与医院
日复一日，年终也录得有盈利。
一万两千吨的大楼黄昏带一副现实语气
隐喻、拟古与老式精神分裂也无法撼动。

偶然是个现代观念。
梦之书的一页
不能是随意一页，必须是
你母亲第一次关注到你父亲那一页。
他们生活在中世纪，而剑还在石头上
牢牢地扎着，上帝与财富是不分的。
没时间细思量：在救护车里
红桃皇后发现了红桃侍从，
于是他成了红桃国王。
但你，你无名的羞涩，
尚没构思出来，故不应在那儿
阅读，想象所有名字可能很要紧。

有人战胜偶然的例子，
达成了政治化身，突然海报显现，
　上升到免费广播时间的天堂，
意义上无止境的纯粹多疑症，
从而获得一种地位，
与当地五金店截然不同，
几个月后它有
可能变成跑步用品店。

突然，我听见街对面的车喊我的名字，
我知道这就是给我的暗示：
如是我说，从前有条路
除非为了些许愉悦，它永不弯曲，
但我们已到了医院。

诗人简介：鲍勃·佩雷尔曼（Bob Perelman,1947- ）美国诗人、评论家、编辑和宾夕法尼亚大学名誉教授。作为 20 世纪 70 年代语言诗运动的关键人物，佩雷尔曼帮助塑造了一种强调语言实验和政治参与的前卫实践，打破传统句法，探索商业化、暴力和历史记忆。受埃兹拉·庞德和马塞尔·普鲁斯特的影响，佩雷尔曼的作品融合了现代主义和后现代主义元素。他翻译的作品包括卡图卢斯和现代俄罗斯诗人的作品。

BOB PERELMAN

Politics

Once there was a straight line which told how it got bent.
Someone died and the town was named:
Pittsburg, Piedmont, Emeryville.
The tree was planted and then cut down,
its leaves scattered by the magic hand of chance.
Now drugstores and hospitals
go through their days, with a profit to show at year’s end.
A twelve thousand ton building at dusk adopts a certain realistic tone
that metaphors, archaisms, and plain old schizophrenia just can’t budge.

Chance is a modern idea.
A page out of the book of dreams
can’t just be any page, it has to be the very page
where your mother first noticed your father.
They lived in the middle ages, when the sword was still stuck
fast in the stone and there was no distinction between God and wealth.
There was no time to be subtle: in the ambulance
the Queen of Hearts noticed the Page of Hearts
thus making him the King of Hearts.
But you, you nameless blush,
aren’t even conceived yet and so aren’t supposed to be there
reading, imagining all the names might mean.

There are examples of people overcoming chance,
achieving political embodiment, the posters suddenly materializing,
   ascending to the heaven of free air time,
the pure paranoia of unendable meaning, thus gaining
a status quite unlike the local hardware store,
  which might, in a few months, become a jogging store.
Suddenly I heard the car across the street call my name
and so I knew that this was my cue:
as I was saying, once there was a road
that never curved except to provide a bit of pleasure,
but here we are already at the hospital.

                                  from O.blek