Li-Young Lee
李立杨
 Li-Young Lee was born in 1957 in Jarkarta, Indonesia. In 1964 when he was 7, his family moved to the United States. He authored numerous books, including The Winged Seed: A Remembrance; Behind My Eyes; Book of My Nights, which won the 2002 William Carlos Williams Award; The City in Which I Love You, which was the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; and Rose, which won the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Poetry Award. He has been the recipient of a Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets, a Lannan Literary Award, a Whiting Writer's Award, the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Award, the I. B. Lavan Award, three Pushcart Prizes, and grants from the Illinois Arts Council, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship.
李立杨1957年生于印尼，七岁时移居美国。他曾荣获多个写作奖，包括美国蓝南文学奖，慧亭写作奖，拉凡奖等。他曾出版多部诗集, 包括《漂的种子，追忆》；《眼里》；《黑夜中，我的书》，此书获得2002 威廉-卡陆斯-威廉斯奖；《这城市是我爱你之地》，此书进入1990年拉蒙诗选；《玫瑰》，此书获得记念待尔莫习瓦兹的诗奖。
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译者
Translator
李作昌
T. C. Lee
李作昌，1936 年生于江西南昌市。1957年毕业于台大电机系，1964年于斯坦佛大学电机系获博士学位。之后在美国高科技工业界从事研发工作长达三十八年。退休以后，重拾年轻时对诗的喜爱，开始写作发表。
T. C. Lee was born in Nanchang, Kiangsi, China 1936. He graduated with B. S. degree from National Taiwan University and from Stanford University with Ph. D in 1964, both in Electrical Engineering. Then he worked in R&D with the high tech industry in US for thirty eight years. After retirement he devoted his long hobby and love in poetry and starting writing poems for several magazines.
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1.
She aches.
And would have me think
it had to do with rivers.
She talks.
Her voice a wheel
and every station on it.
And what she doesn't say
makes the sound of wind in the trees.
She walks,
her path the years sown behind her.
She sleeps
And her sleep becomes
the river I build,
my house beside.
So, on which bank of the river
am I now? waking or dreaming?
She says, Come away from the window. Lie down.
There's no dark out there that isn't first in you.
Close the door. Come lie down.
There's no ocean out there not already in you.
What a narrow residence,
the lifetime of her eyes.
2.
She opens her eyes
and I see.
She counts the birds and I hear
the names of the months and days.
A girl, one of her names
is Change. And my childhood
lasted all of an evening.
Called light, she breathes, my living share
of every moment emerging.
Called life, she is a pomegranate
pecked clean by birds to entirely
become a part of their flying.
Do you love me? she asks.
I love you,
she answers, and the world keeps beginning.
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1.
她疼。
我觉得
是因为河流。
她说话，
音如轮
一站又一站。
她没説的，
是林里的风声。
她行走的，
是她的年华栽培的路。
她睡了，
睡眠化为
我筑造的河，
从我门前流过。
我在河水的此岸？彼岸？
是醒着还是在梦中？
她说，过来躺下，别站在窗前。
你内心没有黑暗, 外面就不会有黑暗。
过来躺下，关起门来。
外面的海洋在你心中早已存在。
小小的眼眶，怎圈得住
她一生的眼光。
2.
她睁眼，
我就看见。
她数着鸟儿，我就听见
日子和月份的名称。
她是个女孩子，名字之一
是变化。 而我的童年
充满于夜间。
另名是光，她呼吸，
唤起我每分每秒的活力。
另名是生命，她是个石榴，
给飞鸟叼啄得干干净净，
变成它们翱翔的成分。
你爱我吗？她问。
我爱你，
她回答，世界就不断地更新。
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In sixth grade Mrs. Walker
slapped the back of my head
and made me stand in the corner
for not knowing the difference
between persimmon and precision.
How to choose
persimmons. This is precision.
Ripe ones are soft and brown-spotted.
Sniff the bottoms. The sweet one
will be fragrant. How to eat:
put the knife away, lay down newspaper.
Peel the skin tenderly, not to tear the meat.
Chew the skin, suck it,
and swallow. Now, eat
the meat of the fruit,
so sweet,
all of it, to the heart.
Donna undresses, her stomach is white.
In the yard, dewy and shivering
with crickets, we lie naked,
face-up, face-down.
I teach her Chinese.
Crickets: chiu chiu. Dew: I've forgotten.
Naked: I've forgotten.
Ni, wo: you and me.
I part her legs,
remember to tell her
she is beautiful as the moon.
Other words
that got me into trouble were
fight and fright, wren and yarn.
Fight was what I did when I was frightened,
Fright was what I felt when I was fighting.
Wrens are small, plain birds,
yarn is what one knits with.
Wrens are soft as yarn.
My mother made birds out of yarn.
I loved to watch her tie the stuff;
a bird, a rabbit, a wee man.
Mrs. Walker brought a persimmon to class
and cut it up
so everyone could taste
a Chinese apple. Knowing
it wasn't ripe or sweet, I didn't eat
but watched the other faces.
My mother said every persimmon has a sun
inside, something golden, glowing,
warm as my face.
Once, in the cellar, I found two wrapped in newspaper,
forgotten and not yet ripe.
I took them and set both on my bedroom windowsill,
where each morning a cardinal
sang, The sun, the sun.
Finally understanding
he was going blind,
my father sat up all one night
waiting for a song, a ghost.
I gave him the persimmons,
swelled, heavy as sadness,
and sweet as love.
This year, in the muddy lighting
of my parents' cellar, I rummage, looking
for something I lost.
My father sits on the tired, wooden stairs,
black cane between his knees,
hand over hand, gripping the handle.
He's so happy that I've come home.
I ask how his eyes are, a stupid question.
All gone, he answers.
Under some blankets, I find a box.
Inside the box I find three scrolls.
I sit beside him and untie
three paintings by my father:
Hibiscus leaf and a white flower.
Two cats preening.
Two persimmons, so full they want to drop from the cloth.
He raises both hands to touch the cloth,
asks, Which is this?
This is persimmons, Father.
Oh, the feel of the wolftail on the silk,
the strength, the tense
precision in the wrist.
I painted them hundreds of times
eyes closed. These I painted blind.
Some things never leave a person:
scent of the hair of one you love,
the texture of persimmons,
in your palm, the ripe weight.
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六年级的娃克尔老师
赏了我后脑勺一掌，
罚我站在墙角上，
我分不清楚两个字，
persimmon（柿子）和precision（精准）。
如何挑选
柿子，那才需要precision。
熟柿子软软的，带棕色斑点，
闻闻柿子下面，
甜柿子有香气。
怎么吃呢：
不用刀，摊开报纸，
别碰坏了得轻轻剥皮。
嚼皮，吸汁，咽下去。
然后，去吃柿肉，
真甜，
一直吃到柿心。
丹娜脱光时，肚皮雪白。
我俩躺在有露水的后院，
一丝不挂，一人面下，一人面上，
哆嗦的跟蟋蟀一样。
我教她中文。
Cricket：蛐蛐。Dew: 中文忘了
Naked：也忘了。
Ni, wo: 你我
我分开她的双腿，
没忘了告诉她
她跟月亮一样美。
别的字 也会给我惹麻烦，
fight打架和fright怕，
wren鹪鹩和yarn毛线。
当我怕frightened时我会打架fight，
当我打架fight时感受到的是怕fright。
wren 是平凡的小鸟，
织毛衣用的是yarn。
小鸟跟毛线一样柔软，
我妈会用毛线织成鸟，
我喜欢看她作结，编织出
小鸟，小兔，小人儿。
娃克尔太太带着柿子到课堂上，
切开来，
给每个学生试尝
中国苹果的滋味。我知道
那柿子没熟也不甜，
我没吃，只去注意大家的脸。
我妈常说，每只柿子里
都有一颗太阳，金色辉煌，
温暖如我的脸蛋儿。
我在地下室发现两个柿子，
还没熟，给人忘了，卷在报纸里，
我把它们移到卧室的窗沿，
每早红雀唱着，
太阳太阳。
老爸终于知道
自己快变成瞎子，
一整夜坐在那儿
等一首歌，一位灵。
我把柿子给了他，
饱满沉重似忧伤，
甜甜蜜蜜又如爱。
今年我在老爸家的地下室，
散淡的灯光下，翻箱倒柜，
去找一样我失去的东西。
他坐在老旧的木头阶梯上，
枴杖在双膝间，
双手重叠紧握着它。
他很高兴我能回家，
我问他眼睛怎么样，问题真傻。
全完了，他回答。
在些毯子下面有一个盒子，
里面有三卷老爸的画。
我坐在他的身边，
一卷卷的展开看。
芙蓉叶子衬白花，
二猫舔身，
两个饱满的柿子，快要从画布上掉下来。
他抬起双手去摸
这是什么？
是柿子，老爸。
唉，丝绸摸着像狐尾毛，
唉，腕的力道，
紧而精准。
我闭着眼睛画过几百次，
这几幅是眼瞎后的作品。
有些东西永远不会离开你：
爱人头发的清香，
柿子在你手中时的
皮质感，跟熟透时的份量。
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