《卡明斯诗选》【美】E. E. 卡明斯
▷美国诗坛顽童肯明斯(代序)余光中:https://shimo.im/docs/ZzkLMwVJbPHEQMAQ/
▷《等于5》前言
e. e.卡明斯
鉴于有人认为我的技巧要么复杂,要么原创,要么兼有,出版商出于礼貌要求我为这本书写一篇前言。
如果我有一个关于技巧的理论,那么它至少是远非原创的;也并不复杂。我可以援引burlesk viz的《永恒的问题与不朽的答案》中的一句话来表述,即“你想用个孩子拍到女人?——不,我会用砖头拍她”。像喜剧作家burlesk,我病态地喜欢那种创造出动感的精确。
如果诗人算个什么人,他就是那种任什么东西对他都不算什么的人——是那种痴迷于自己制造东西的人。和所有痴迷一样,对于制造的痴迷有弊;举例说,我对挣钱的唯一兴趣会是自己去造钞。好在幸运的是我宁可去造别的一切,包括火车头和玫瑰花。有了玫瑰花和火车头(更别提杂技演员春天电科尼岛七月四日老鼠的眼睛和尼亚加拉瀑布),我的“诗”就特能较劲。
它们互相之间也较劲,还与大象和埃尔·格列柯较劲。
对于动词的必然的专注和偏爱给了诗人一种无价的优势:当非制造者以2乘2等于4这样完全不可否认的事实来自我满足时,他却得意地享受着一个纯然不可抗拒的真理(它以一种缩略的形式出现在本书的书名页上)。
(附原文)
somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near
your slightest look will easily unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose
or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing
(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands