Philip Levine has published 16 books of poems, as well as several volumes of translations and two collections of essays. His honors include two National Book Awards, two National Book Critics Circle Awards, the American Book Award, the Ruth Lily Poetry Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize for poetry.

菲利普-莱文出生于底特律，早年在汽车厂做工，为美国第十八任桂冠诗人。曾出版过16本诗集和一些译著。他曾获普利策奖、国家图书奖等众多奖项。

谢茜生于一九七五年，籍贯四川。1994年考入北京大学信息管理系，2001年进入北京矿业大学研究生院英语系英语语言文学专业学习。爱好写作，弹钢琴，拉小提琴等。现在美国从事汉语教学，居住于密歇根州。

Xie Qian was born in 1975 in the Sichuang Province. She studied at the Information Management Department of Beijing University and the English Language and Literature Department of the graduate school of the China University of Mining and Technology in Beijing. She enjoys writing, playing piano and painting. She is teaching the Chinese language in Michigan.

Our Valley

我们的山谷

We don't see the ocean, not ever, but in July and August 
when the worst heat seems to rise from the hard clay
of this valley, you could be walking through a fig orchard
when suddenly the wind cools and for a moment
you get a whiff of salt, and in that moment you can almost
believe something is waiting beyond the Pacheco Pass,
something massive, irrational, and so powerful even
the mountains that rise east of here have no word for it.

You probably think I'm nuts saying the mountains
have no word for ocean, but if you live here
you begin to believe they know everything.
They maintain that huge silence we think of as divine,
a silence that grows in autumn when snow falls
slowly between the pines and the wind dies
to less than a whisper and you can barely catch
your breath because you're thrilled and terrified.

You have to remember this isn't your land.
It belongs to no one, like the sea you once lived beside
and thought was yours. Remember the small boats
that bobbed out as the waves rode in, and the men
who carved a living from it only to find themselves
carved down to nothing. Now you say this is home,
so go ahead, worship the mountains as they dissolve in dust,
wait on the wind, catch a scent of salt, call it our life.
			

我们从没见过大海，从未有过。唯独七八月间，
当溽暑仿似自村落的硬泥地上升腾，
你行经一亩无花果的林园，
倏尔，风清凉了许多，
那一瞬，一丝咸味飘入你鼻端。
此时，你几近相信，
在帕切科山口之外，有什么
在等候着你，它廓形伟宏、不合情理、气势强劲，
以致于此处东面隆起的山峦，
亦无言以对。

你或许认为我是个痴人，
才讲出山峦对海洋无言以对的话。
但是，倘若你居住于此，
你会认为其实它们全然知晓一切 。
它们坚守着我们视作神圣的
那份巨大的静默。
那份静默，秋日里愈发寂宁了，
朵朵雪花晏然飘落于杉树间。
风息了，较耳畔那缕喁喁私语，还更轻。
你几近没法喘息，只因你的心扑扑在跳，
悚然而惊。

你须记着，这并非你的土地。
它不归属任何一人，像那片海，你曾傍水而居，
以为它是你的。
记得白浪自远方翻涌奔来时，上下颠簸的舟帆，
以此维系生计的人们，到头来，
囊中空无一物。
此时你称它为家，好吧，
膜拜那重重峰峦，当它们泯灭为尘。
候着风，嗅出一小点盐味，
唤它为我们的生活。