蔗尾蜂房

[越過阿爾卑斯山]
--Robert Lowell (1917-1977), 羅浩原 譯

(從羅馬到巴黎的火車上。1950，是年教宗庇阿斯七世闡釋了聖母瑪麗亞的聖體昇天教令。)

讀到瑞士人如何也擲地嘆息著放棄
又一次，埃佛勒斯峰仍舊
未能探測，我看著開往巴黎的軟臥列車奔馳著
眼神茫然地在阿爾卑斯淡黃的雪上游移
羅馬倩兮！我望見我們的侍者們
踮著腳走去敲響他們的盅鈴。
生命變成風景。我雅不願意
離開了我心繫的上帝之城。
彼處拜倒女人裙下的墨索里尼曾招展過
凱撒的鷹旗。他同我等一樣
只是，太平凡了點。我多羨慕那引人側目的
揮霍，被我們的祖輩們花在他們的壯游上——
戴假髮的維多利亞諸賢哲如是理解了宇宙，
同時將他們的信託基金吹送到全世界。

當梵蒂岡發佈瑪麗亞昇天教令，
群眾在聖彼得大教堂前狂呼「教宗」。
聖父放下刮鬍子的鏡子，
傾聽。他的電鬍刀嗚嗚鳴著，
他的寵物金絲雀在他左手邊啼叫。
科學之光無法握住一支蠟燭
去參加瑪麗亞昇天式——就那麼神奇的一拂，
生出天使羽翼，華麗如熱帶叢林的珍禽！
但誰相信這一切?誰能夠理解?
朝聖者們仍舊吻著聖彼得的銅塑涼鞋。
「領袖」吊死了，光禿、被踹過骷髏頭仍在發言。
上帝牧其民去領受一擊賜死
教宗的瑞士錦衣侍衛斜握他們的長矛去推擠
噢，庇阿斯！推擠自相踐踏的恐怖人群。

我們的登山火車已回到了地面
厭煩了車輪亂發脾氣的竊竊之聲，
視線模糊的自我在舖位上蹬來蹬去
躺好吧，看看太陽神伸展早晨的肢體
將他的腳踝栽種到土壤裡...
景物一一後退，荒涼的阿爾卑斯，一座萬神殿，
獨眼巨人被火烙過的眼窩子。
此處沒有標示海拔的牌子
那希臘人一度到達的高度，彼時女神佇立，
君王、教宗、哲士與金枝玉葉，
純淨的心智與大鐮刀刀頭的謀殺——
密諾娃，腦之流產。

就要到巴黎了，我們的黑色經典，摔碎了
如伊特拉斯坎古杯上的殺人君王。



[Beyond the Aps]
--Robert Lowell(1917-1977)

(On the train from Rome to Paris. 1950, the year Pius XII defined the dogma of Mary’s Bodily assumption.)

Reading how even the Swiss had thrown the sponge
in once again and Everest was still
unscaled, I watched our Paris Pullman lunge
mooning across the fallow Alpine snow.
O bella Roma! I saw our stewards go
forward on tiptoe banging on their gongs.
Life changed to landscape. Much against my will
I left the City of God where it belongs.
There the skirt-mad Mussolini unfurled
the eagle of Caesar. He was one of us
only, pure prose. I envy the conspicuous
waste of our grandparents on their grand tours——
long-haired Victorian sages accepted the universe,
while breezing on their trust funds through the world.

When the Vatican made Mary’s Assumption dogma
The crowds at San Pietro screamed Papa.
The Holy Father dropped his shaving glass,
And listened. His electric razor purred,
His pet canary chirped on his left hand.
The lights of science couldn’t hold a candle
to Mary risen——at one miraculous stroke,
angel-wing’d, gorgeous as a jungle bird!
But who believed this? Who could understand?
Pilgrims still kissed Saint Peter’s brazen sandal.
The Duce’s lynched, bare, booted skull still spoke.
God herded his people to the coup de grace——
The costumed Switzers sloped their pikes to push,
O Pius, through the monstrous human crush…

Our mountain-climbing train had come to earth.
Tired of the querulous hush-hush of the wheels,
the blear-eyed ego kicking in my berth
lay still, and saw Apollo plant his heels
on terra firma through the morning’s thigh…
each backward, wasted Alps, a Partheon,
fire-branded socket of the Cyclops’ eye.
There were no tickets for that altitude
once held by Hellas, when the Goddess stood,
prince, pope, philosopher and golden bough,
pure mind and murder at the scything prow——
Miverva, the miscarriage of the brain.

Now Paris, our black classic, breaking up
Like killer kings on an Etruscan cup.