蔗尾蜂房

[水藍之內]
--Maura Dooley (1957- ), 羅浩原 譯

我女兒亮了亮她的鰭，
接著就游過了所有的防範
進入人類和善的水藍乳液中。

她肌膚被陽光扎透呈橄欖石、綠寶石色
所有深處的私密陰影
是一些我們猜不透的顏色

有時她潔淨，甚至摩擦著
糾纏在一起的長長水草。她嚇了一跳
被那滑溜的複葉，日本人稱為髮菜之物

但萬物必有用處。她要烹了牠，
料理一條她掬在手中的魚：
河豚，她切去牠一個個的小毒囊

精巧地掐斷以她十根尖銳的牙

譯自：http://www.people.ex.ac.uk/smnamjos/Poems/Dooley.html


[Into the Blue]

My daughter flashed her fins,
then swam past all precaution
into the blue milk of human kindness.

Sunlight struck her skin olivine, emerald,
all the secret shades of the deep,
colours we cannot guess at.

Sometimes her clean, even strokes
tangle in the long weed. She is surprised
by the slippery fronds the Japanese call Hair Plant.

But everything has its use. She cooks it,
serves it with a fish caught in her cupped hand:
Fugu, she cuts away its little poison sacs

with ten delicate nips of her pointed teeth.


From Explaining Magnetism (Bloodaxe, Britain, 1991)