T.S. Eliot ： 烧毁的诺顿 －－第五章

《烧毁的诺顿 －－第五章》

BURNT NORTON
(No. 1 of 'Four Quartets')

By T.S. Eliot  (浮生欢娱译）

惟在时间中，言语前行，
音乐前行；然而只有生者
方能寂灭。言语，述说后便进入
静止，犹如一只中国瓷瓶
在静止中运动不息。
当乐音缭绕，那不是小提琴归于沉寂，
不只是那样，而是动静共存。
或者说那是终止先于开始，
在开始之前和结束以后，
结束和开始便一直存在。
重要的乃是现在。言语在重负下
疲乏、迸裂、有时甚至破碎，
在张力下跌落、溜走、消失，
或因表达不当而腐朽，不会停留在原处，
不会静止不动。刺耳声、
呵斥、嘲弄，抑或仅是絮叨，
总在攻击它们。废墟中的词，
最易受到诱惑之声的攻击，
还有葬礼之舞中哭泣的阴影，
不能安抚的卡米拉之恸哭。

模式的细节是一种运动，
好比十阶梯的图形所显示。
欲望本身是一种运动，
而非它本身是令人向往的。
爱本身静谧不动，
只是运动的缘由和终结，
无始无终，无所乞求，
除非牵涉到时间，
囿于某种形式的限制，
介于存在和非存在之间。
蓦然在一道阳光中，
甚至当尘埃四起，
绿叶中扬起一阵
潜在的孩童笑声。
赶紧，此地，现在，永远—
滑稽可笑的是，虚掷而悲哀的时间
伸展于之前和其后。

V

Words move, music moves
Only in time; but that which is only living
Can only die. Words, after speech, reach
Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern,
Can words or music reach
The stillness, as a Chinese jar still
Moves perpetually in its stillness.
Not the stillness of the violin, while the note lasts,
Not that only, but the co-existence,
Or say that the end precedes the beginning,
And the end and the beginning were always there
Before the beginning and after the end.
And all is always now. Words strain,
Crack and sometimes break, under the burden,
Under the tension, slip, slide, perish,
Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place,
Will not stay still. Shrieking voices
Scolding, mocking, or merely chattering,
Always assail them. The Word in the desert
Is most attacked by voices of temptation,
The crying shadow in the funeral dance,
The loud lament of the disconsolate chimera.

The detail of the pattern is movement,
As in the figure of the ten stairs.
Desire itself is movement
Not in itself desirable;
Love is itself unmoving,
Only the cause and end of movement,
Timeless, and undesiring
Except in the aspect of time
Caught in the form of limitation
Between un-being and being.
Sudden in a shaft of sunlight
Even while the dust moves
There rises the hidden laughter
Of children in the foliage
Quick now, here, now, always—
Ridiculous the waste sad time
Stretching before and after.