A Mid-Autumn Dream
someone has reaped
the moon
at twelve noon
《梦中秋》
苇欢
有人收割了
正午十二点的
月亮
Fish
I tell my daughter
that goldfish don’t understand what man says
she doesn’t believe it, instead
she brings a small stool to the fish tank
sits on it and starts telling a story of the fighting roosters
it ends in a while
and she comes over to make a cheerful
report:
the fish did react to her just now
by swimming around first
and then making
a long
poop
《鱼》
苇欢
我告诉女儿
金鱼听不懂人话
她不信
搬个小板凳
坐在鱼缸边
开始讲小鸡打架的故事
过了一会
故事讲完了
她兴奋地跑来汇报
鱼有反应
一开始它只是游
后来
它边游
边拉屎
Fragment
The satin is so blue.
Golden grains keep falling.
I remember on another brilliant afternoon like today
threads of cloud lingering above, I dwelled
in the tiny pupils
of your glass-like eyes.
A laugh swelling on your teeth like rising tide
overflowed your lip and flooded
my skin.
You took my hand, pressing a kiss on my pearl earrings.
One day, you said, you would marry a woman
wearing pearls.
We walked along the dike, the sea water rippling afar.
A fisherman on the shoal, bending down under a straw hat
stripped oysters from the mud and threw them into his bamboo basket.
After he left, the sun sank into the sea corner.
No dust in the air, the ground
sending off an odour of asphalt.
We sat down in a cookshop afterwards, in the scent of pepper
the flickering candle light, I felt I’d known you
for years.
《片断》
苇欢
绸缎这样蓝。
金黄麦粒成束下落。
我想起一个同样灿烂的午后，
云丝绵长，
你玻璃眼球里的我，
变成中央细小的瞳孔。
一种笑在你齿上涨潮，
漫出唇口，一下子沾湿我的皮肤。
你拉起我的手，吻过我的珍珠耳串。
将来你要迎娶，你说，一个佩戴珍珠的女人。
整个下午，我们走在堤上，海水微漾。
浅滩上的渔人在草帽下弓起腰，
从泥块中剥出沉甸甸的牡蛎，丢进竹篓。
他们离去后，夕阳坠入海角，
空气中没有微尘，
地面散发松软的柏油香。
后来，我们在飘满椒香的小店坐下，
烛光恍惚间，我们已经
相识多年。
Listening *
Sitting in a high-back chair
I’m listening
to a room, which is not quiet
late at night
Having listened for a long time
I feel, sometimes, as if the door doesn’t exist
the wall isn’t there, either
In the wilderness
a sound, like a certain bird, startled
flies out of the high grass
rubbing fiercely
against my ears
I remember one night
outside my door
a man repeatedly asked
his cell phone, “Are you at home?”
I listened awhile
feeling myself on the verge of a reply
“Yes, I am…”
* This translation has also appeared in The Canberra Times, vol. 92, 30th September 2017, the editors having given permission to republish it in Double Dialogues.
《听》
苇欢
我坐在靠背椅上
听一间
夜深
人不静的房子
有时听久了
感觉门不存在
墙也不存在
在一片旷野上
声音像某种
受惊的鸟
从深深的草丛中飞起
凌厉地擦过耳朵
记得有一晚
一个人在门外反复问
他的手机，你在家吗，在吗
听了好一会
我差一点失声答他
我在
Nocturne
high on the terrace
something
is dripping
drop
by drop
going past
my window
an hour already
I’m listening
to the sound
of the droplets
the distant night sky
is eyeless
all lights
going out
《夜曲》
苇欢
高高的露台上
它们一滴一滴地
坠落
经过我的窗
一个小时了
它们坠落的声音
一滴一滴的
深远的夜空
没有眼睛
那些光芒
都坠落了
On September 5
the setting sun
has canary-yellow rind
with a tinge of red
in the middle
like a pomegranate
from home
the one we forgot to pick
before the end of summer
《9月5日》
苇欢
在傍晚18点40分
阴湿的空气中
夕阳淡黄的
外皮
中央
一团红晕
很像故乡夏末
寂静的石榴
Summer Comes
after several days of rain
a streak of morning light
flows into my bedroom
it touches my spine
climbs onto the globe
flies past the Amazon
and the equator
taking away the roar of planes
over the Atlantic
before it finally lands
on my bookshelf
waking up Dante
《立夏》
苇欢
连绵多日阴雨后
清晨一道暖光
流入房间
擦过我的脊骨
翻上地球仪
掠过亚马孙平原
飞越赤道
带走大西洋上空
飞机的轰鸣
抵达我的书架
叫醒但丁
The World
I see beautiful, delicate women, like spotless
porcelain dolls.
I see others, plain, vulgar and old
their faces,
shoulders, abdomens and vaginas bear the weight
of a hundred men.
I see a prostitute gently stroking the holes
in her stockings,
a young mother clutching a quivering child
behind her husband.
I see some men, hard as stones.
I see others
whose skin is whiter
than moonlight.
They wear gowns
to cover their hairy legs.
Before making utterances, they take out their artificial teeth
and put them into a jewellery box.
They make the black penis
in their mouth
declare the truth.
I see some dark places
in the world,
darker
than others.
《世界》
苇欢
我看见
漂亮、精致的女人
像瓷娃娃纤尘不染。
看见其他
丑陋、粗鄙、日渐老去。
她们的脸部、肩膀、小腹、阴道
承载了一百个雄性的重量。
我看见
一个妓女轻轻抚摸
丝袜上的洞，
一个年轻母亲在丈夫身后
拥紧发抖的孩子。
我看见
一些男人
像石块一样坚决。
看见其他
肤色比月光白。
他们穿裙子遮住
长满毛的小腿。
发声前他们取下假牙
放进首饰盒。
他们用口中的黑阴茎
宣布真理。
我看见
世界上一些暗处，
比另一些
更暗。
Cui Yuwei, born in 1983 in Xinyang, the southernmost sub-tropical city of the populous south-eastern province of Henan on the Huai River, a province regarded as one of the three ancient cradles of Chinese civilisation. After completing her masters in English literature at Wuhan University, she has taken a lectureship with Beijing Normal University in the Pearl River Delta city of Zhuhai, where she continues to practise as a bi-lingual poet and translator. Indeed, her work has been widely disseminated through literary journals in Australasia, India, North America, and Indo-China. She has recently published her first poetry collection, Fish Bones (Macau: Flying Island Books, 2017).