010-When this American woman/當這個美國女人

　
當這個美國女人

當這個美國女人，
腿股上綁著紅色便服，
像放火燒林的蒙古部族
發出雷般的響聲經過我的座前，
城市被搶奪一空
脆弱的百年建築
崩解飛濺於街；
而我的眼
卻為那繡花般的中國女孩燃燒
我那已然蒼老的眼
藏身在巨幅山水的薄樹松林間
顯得如此藐小，
彷彿你的頭一轉動
他們就失落於時光之中。

─李歐納柯恩《讓我們比擬神話》1956
─13 譯自《異地樂章》1993 / 2009.7


When this American woman

When this American woman,
whose thighs are bound in casual red cloth,
comes thundering past my sitting place
like a forest-burning Mongol tribe,
the city is ravished
and brittle buildings of a hundred years
splash into the street;
and my eyes are burnt
for the embroidered Chinese girls,
already old,
and so small between the thin pines
on these enormous landscapes,
that if you turn your head
they are lost for hours.

(by Leonard Cohen from "Let Us Compare Mythologies", 1956)
("Stranger Music--selected poems and songs", 1993)