卡瓦菲斯的两首诗

-- zorow_2000译自Edmund Keeley的英文

墙

毫无体谅，毫无同情，毫无羞耻
他们在我四周筑起了墙，高高厚厚的墙
现在我坐在这里，感到绝望
我无力思考，这一宿命咬噬着我的大脑——
因为在墙外我有那么多要做的事情
他们造墙的时候，我怎么会毫无察觉！
可是，我从未听到那些造墙的人，哪怕是一个声响
不知不觉，他们将我封闭在了世界之外

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Walls
--C.P. Cavafy

Without consideration, without pity, without shame
they've built walls around me, thick and high
And now I sit here, feeling hopeless.
I can't think of anything else: this fate gnaws at my mind;
because I had so much to do outside.
when they were building the walls, how could I not have noticed?
But I never heard the builders, not a sound.
Imperceptibly, they've closed me off the outside world.

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城市
 
你说：
“我要去另一个国家，另一个海岸，
找到另一个城市，比现在这个更好。
我竭尽所能，可总是事与愿违，
而我的心——如同死物一般——被下葬掩埋
我的大脑还要在此地发霉多久
无论我奔向何处，无论我如何寻望
我都看到在此地，我的生命留下的黑色残骸
就在这里
我度过了多少个岁月，我虚掷它们，将它们销毁殆尽。”
 
你不会找到新的国家，你不会找到另一个海岸
这个城市会永远追随着你
你会踏上同样的街道，在同样的邻区
变老，在同样的房子里满头灰白
你永远都逃不出这个城市，别寄希望与他处
没有船可以渡你，没有路
你已经在此地，在这个小小的角落，虚掷了你的生命
它将永远死去，无论你身处何地
 
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The City
--C.P. Cavafy


You said: “I’ll go to another country, go to another shore,
find another city better than this one.
Whatever I try to do is fated to turn out wrong
and my heart lies buried like something dead.
How long can I let my mind moulder in this place?
Wherever I turn, wherever I look,
I see the black ruins of my life, here,
where I’ve spent so many years, wasted them, destroyed them totally.”

You won’t find a new country, won’t find another shore.
This city will always pursue you.
You’ll walk the same streets, grow old
in the same neighborhoods, turn gray in these same houses.
You’ll always end up in this city. Don’t hope for things elsewhere:
there’s no ship for you, there’s no road.
Now that you’ve wasted your life here, in this small corner,
you’ve destroyed it everywhere in the world.

 
*有一个黄灿然译的中文版本，译得真好：《卡瓦菲斯诗集》，河北教育出版社