Elizabeth Bishop was born in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1911. Elizabeth Bishop won a number of awards, including the Pulitzer Prize，the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. She has published more than ten volumes of poetry.

伊莉莎白-毕肖普1911年生于美国麻省。她曾获得普利策奖、美国国家图书奖、国家图书评论界奖等许多奖项。她曾出版过十多本诗集。

晓路，自由撰稿人，其诗作散见各大报刊。现居中国广东。

Xiao Lu, free-lance writer. His poems appeared in a number of poetry journals. He lives in Guangdong, China.

At the Fishhouses

在渔房

Although it is a cold evening,
down by one of the fishhouses
an old man sits netting,
his net, in the gloaming almost invisible,
a dark purple-brown,
and his shuttle worn and polished.
The air smells so strong of codfish
it makes one's nose run and one's eyes water.
The five fishhouses have steeply peaked roofs
and narrow, cleated gangplanks slant up
to storerooms in the gables
for the wheelbarrows to be pushed up and down on.
All is silver: the heavy surface of the sea,
swelling slowly as if considering spilling over,
is opaque, but the silver of the benches,
the lobster pots, and masts, scatteredopake
among the wild jagged rocks,
is of an apparent translucence
like the small old buildings with an emerald moss
growing on their shoreward walls.
The big fish tubs are completely lined
with layers of beautiful herring scales
and the wheelbarrows are similarly plastered
with creamy iridescent coats of mail,
with small iridescent flies crawling on them.
Up on the little slope behind the houses,
set in the sparse bright sprinkle of grass,
is an ancient wooden capstan
cracked, with two long bleached handles
and some melancholy stains, like dried blood,
where the ironwork has rusted.
The old man accepts a Lucky Strike.
He was a friend of my grandfather.
We talk of the decline in the population
and of codfish and herring
while he waits for a herring boat to come in.
There are sequins on his vest and on his thumb.
He has scraped the scales, the principal beauty,
from unnumbered fish with that black old knife,
the blade of which is almost worn away.

Down at the water's edge, at the place
where they haul up the boats, up the long ramp
descending into the water, thin silver
tree trunks are laid horizontally
across the gray stones, down and down
at intervals of four or five feet.

Cold dark deep and absolutely clear,
element bearable to no mortal,
to fish and to seals . . . One seal particularly
I have seen here evening after evening.
He was curious about me. He was interested in music;
like me a believer in total immersion,
so I used to sing him Baptist hymns.
I also sang "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God."
He stood up in the water and regarded me
steadily, moving his head a little.
Then he would disappear, then suddenly emerge
almost in the same spot, with a sort of shrug
as if it were against his better judgment.
Cold dark deep and absolutely clear,
the clear gray icy water . . . Back, behind us,
the dignified tall firs begin.
Bluish, associating with their shadows,
a million Christmas trees stand
waiting for Christmas. The water seems suspended
above the rounded gray and blue-gray stones.
I have seen it over and over, the same sea, the same,
slightly, indifferently swinging above the stones,
icily free above the stones,
above the stones and then the world.
If you should dip your hand in,
your wrist would ache immediately,
your bones would begin to ache and your hand would burn
as if the water were a transmutation of fire
that feeds on stones and burns with a dark gray flame.
If you tasted it, it would first taste bitter,
then briny, then surely burn your tongue.
It is like what we imagine knowledge to be:
dark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free,
drawn from the cold hard mouth
of the world, derived from the rocky breasts
forever, flowing and drawn, and since
our knowledge is historical, flowing, and flown. 
			

虽然这是一个寒冷的夜晚，
但在一个渔房里,
仍有一个老人坐在那里结网。
他的网，在暮霭中几乎无法看见
只是一片紫褐
而他的梭已被磨光用旧。
那空气中的鳕鱼气味如此强烈
让人流鼻涕，眼含泪水。
那五个渔房有尖峭的屋顶
而从阁楼的储藏室中伸下狭窄的跳板
为手推车的上下提供方便。
一切都是银色的：
那大海沉重的表面是不透明的，
慢慢地隆起仿佛在思忖着涌出，
但散布在荒野的乱石间
那长椅，那龙虾罐，那船桅
呈半透明的银色，
正像那经年的小屋
在临海的墙上长出翠绿的苔藓。
那大鱼盆已经被鲱鱼的美丽的鳞片
画上重重皱纹，
而那手推车也被同样滑腻的东西涂满，
密布厚厚一层虹彩色的苍蝇。
在那屋后小小的斜坡上，
藏在反射着微光的玻璃后，
有一具古老的绞盘，破败不堪，
两个长长的把手已被磨白
铁制部分上
还有一些阴沉的斑痕，就像风干的血。
接受“好彩”烟的老人，
是我祖父的朋友。
当他等待捕鳕船到来的时候，
我们谈论人口的下降
还有鲱鱼和鳕鱼。
他的罩衫和拇指上戴着铁环，
从被肢解的鱼身上
刮去鳞片——
那最美的部分，
用一把黑色的老刀
那刀刃已磨损殆尽。

再向下到水的边缘，
在那拖船上岸的地方，
那长长的斜坡俯身水中，
细细的银色树干
穿过灰色的岩石
平行地横卧，渐次向下
中间相隔四五英尺的距离。

寒冷黑暗深沉而又完全地清澈，
是凡世无法忍受的元素，
对鱼和海豹……尤其是对一只海豹。
我已经夜复一夜地看着这里，
那海豹对我感到好奇。它对音乐深感兴趣，
就像我是一个沉溺的信徒，
所以我对它吟唱圣歌。
我还唱道：“上帝是我坚不可摧的堡垒。”
它站立在水中向我行注目礼
慢慢地稍稍移动它的脑袋
它时不时地消失一下，然后又在突然出现
在同一个涡涡里，耸耸肩
就像久立妨碍了它的判断力。
寒冷黑暗而就完全地清澈
清澈的灰色冰水……后面，在我们背后，
开始着那威严的杉树行列。
幽蓝幽蓝，陪伴着它们的阴影，
一百万棵圣诞树静立
等待着圣诞节的来临。那水看来悬挂着
悬挂在圆圆的蓝灰色石头上。
我已经无数次看过它，那同样的海，同样地，
轻轻地，心不在焉地敲打着石头，
冷冰冰地自在处于石头之上，
在石头之上然后在世界之上。
如果你把手浸入水中，
你的腕子立即会感到疼痛而手感到灼伤
就像那水是火之化身
消耗石头，燃烧出灰色火焰。
如果你尝那水，它开始是苦的，
然后是咸的，之后肯定会灼痛你的舌头。
这就是我们想像中“知识”的样子：
黑暗，苦咸，清澈，运动着而且完全自由，
从那世界的
坚冷的口中汲出，源自那永恒的石化乳房
汲汲流淌，我们的知识是历史性的，流动着的
转瞬便飞逝。