When I was only three or four, I fell in love with poetry, with the rhythms and the music of language;
当我只有三四岁时便爱上了诗歌，爱它充满节奏和音乐般的语言；
with the power of metaphor and of imagery, poetry being the essence of communication -- the discipline, the distillation.
也爱它富含的隐喻和意象，诗是交流的本质与精华--是锤炼，是升华。
And all these years later, the poems I'll read today are from my just-finished seventh book of poetry.
多年后的今天，我将诵读的所有诗篇皆来自我刚完成的第七部诗集。
Well, five years ago, I was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.
五年前我罹患帕金森氏症。
Though there's no cure yet, advances in treatment are really impressive.
虽然现在还没有治愈的方法，但治疗方法的进步令人钦佩。
But you can imagine that I was appalled to learn that women are largely left out of research trials,
你完全可以想象当我得知女性通常被临床试验所忽略时的恐惧，
despite gender-specific medical findings having demonstrated that we are not actually just small men --
尽管性别区分的医学研究成果已经论证了我们女性并不是“小男人”--
who happen to have different reproductive systems. Gender-specific medicine is good for men, too.
我们拥有不同的生殖系统。当然医药上的性别区分同样对男性亦有好处。
But you bring to a crisis the person you already are, including the, yes,
但作为人，早已深陷危机，
momentum that you've learned to invoke through passionate caring and through action,
包括那些热情的关注与积极的行动，都为你带来力量。
both of which require but also create energy.
在你付出的同时，也在创造能量。
So as an activist, I began working with the Parkinson's Disease Foundation -- that's pdf.org
所以作为一名活跃份子，我加入了帕金森氏症基金会，他们网站是pdf.org，
to create a major initiative to put women on the Parkinson's disease map.
其发起的主倡是将女性纳入到帕金森氏症的版图中去。
And as a poet, I began working with this subject matter, finding it tragic, hilarious, sometimes even joyful.
而作为一名诗人，我开始更加关注这一议题，探寻它其中的悲剧、滑稽、有时甚至是喜悦的情感。
I do not feel diminished by Parkinson's; I feel distilled by it,
我并没有因为帕金森而低糜；反而因此得到了升华，
and I actually very much like the woman I'm distilling into.
而且事实上我非常喜欢这个升华后的自己。
"No Signs of Struggle"
“没有挣扎的痕迹”
Growing small requires enormity of will:
变得渺小需要极大的意志；
just sitting still in the doctor's waiting room watching the future shuffle in and out,
枯坐在医生的候诊室，看着未来在眼前不停交替，当未来俯身，
watching it stoop; stare at you while you try not to look.
与你凝视你却目光回避。
Rare is an exchange: a smile of brief, wry recognition.
罕见如一场交易：如一抹稍纵即逝的微笑，一个带有褒奖的讽刺。
You are the new kid on the block. Everyone here was you once.
你在这个群体中如新生的稚子。但曾经，这里的每一个人都如现在的你。
You are still learning that growing small requires a largeness of spirit you can't fit into yet:
你渐渐懂得变得渺小需要一个博大的灵魂，你还无法将它装入身体；
acceptance of irritating help from those who love you; giving way and over, but not up.
忍受着那些爱你之人嘘寒问暖所带来的苦涩；放任它们，但不放弃自己。
You've swallowed hard the contents of the "Drink Me" bottle, and felt yourself shrink.
吞咽着“喝下去”瓶子中的苦药，感受着渺小后的自己。
Now, familiar furniture looms, floors tilt, and doorknobs yield only when wrestled round with both hands.
那一刻，熟悉的家具变得模糊，地板倾斜，唯有双手并用才能将门把开启。
It demands colossal patience, all this growing small:
慢慢变小需要异常的耐力。你的一切都在减弱，
your diminished sleep at night, your handwriting, your voice, your height.
你夜里的睡眠，你白昼的书写，你的声音，你的身体。
You are more the incredible shrinking woman than the Buddhist mystic, serene, making do with less.
你是那萎缩着但最不可思议的女人，安详，无为，胜过佛徒释子。
Less is not always more. Yet in this emptying space, space glimmers, becoming visible.
少既是多并非永恒成立。至少在这个虚无中并非如此，虚无的微光变得可视。
Here is a place behind the eyes of those accustomed by what some would call diminishment.
此处隐匿在常人的视线之外，或许被称之为虚无之地。
It is a place of merciless poetry, a gift of presence previously ignored, drowned in the daily clutter.
此处充斥着无情之诗，现世的礼物曾被忽视，淹没在日常的嘈杂里。
Here every gesture needs intention, is alive with consciousness. Nothing is automatic.
此处的一举一动都有其意义，生命既是觉知。万物皆有识。
You can spot it in the provocation of a button, an arm poking at a sleeve,
你会察觉，按钮可能就是挑衅，或是长臂穿过衣袖，
a balancing act at a night-time curb while negotiating the dark. Feats of such modest valor,
又或是艰难的夜行穿梭于无际的黑暗。坐拥丰功伟绩的勇士，
who would suspect them to be exercises in an intimate, fierce discipline, a metaphysics of being relentlessly aware?
会扪心自问自己是否勇猛刚烈，训练有素，是否过于执着古板？
Such understated power here, in these tottering dancers who exert stupendous effort on tasks most view as insignificant.
这里的一切是如此节制，那些蹒跚的舞者极力舞动的惊世之作在此处不过是微尘一粒。
Such quiet beauty here, in these, my soft-voiced, stiff-limbed people; such resolve masked by each placid face.
此处，如此宁静美丽，那些人微言轻者，那些身体僵硬者；波澜不惊的面孔隐藏着坚毅不屈，
There is immensity required in growing small, so bent on such unbending grace.
彼此昭示变得渺小需要万千努力，所以，请屈服在不屈的恩泽里。
Thank you. This one is called "On Donating My Brain to Science."
谢谢你们。接下来，这首诗叫“将我的大脑献给科学”。
Not a problem. Skip over all the pages reassuring religious people.
无妨。略过一切安抚信教者的页面。
Already a universal donor: kidneys, corneas, liver, lungs, tissue, heart, veins, whatever.
我已是一名普通的捐赠者；肾脏，角膜，肝脏，双肺，组织，心脏及脉络，一切悉听尊便。
Odd that the modest brain never imagined its unique value in research,
奇怪的是，哪怕最优秀的大脑也未曾设想过自己的研究价值，
maybe saving someone else from what it is they're not quite sure I have. Flattering, that.
或许发现的不治之症能拯救与我相似的病患。这些，不过是奉承之言。
So fill in the forms, drill through the answers, trill out a blithe spirit.
填好表单，写下答案，进入快乐与豁然。
And slice me, dice me, spread me on your slides. Find what I'm trying to tell you.
解剖我，肢解我，把我涂抹在你的玻片上。找到我想告诉你的万语千言。
Earn me, learn me, scan me, squint through your lens. Uncover what I'd hint at if I could.
悉知我，研究我，检视我，透过你斜视着的显微镜头。解开一切我所能遗留的迹象。
Be my guest, do your best, harvest me, track the clues.
做我的客人，尽你的所能，沿着蛛丝马迹，获悉我留下的线索。
This was a good brain while alive. This was a brain that paid its dues.
这颗大脑曾优秀而强健。也曾倾其所有尽其所能。
So slice me, dice me, smear me on your slides, stain me, explain me, drain me like a cup. Share me, hear me:
所以解剖我，肢解我，将我变作标本样片，浸染我，解读我，如一杯清茶将我一饮而尽。听我诉说，将我分享。
I want to be used I want to be used I want to be used up.
我希望被使用，我希望被使用，我希望被彻底用尽！

And this one's called "The Ghost Light."
接下来的这首，叫做“幽光”。
Lit from within is the sole secure way to traverse dark matter.
驱散黑暗唯一可靠的方法便是从内部燃起微光。
Some life forms -- certain mushrooms, snails, jellyfish, worms -- glow bioluminescent, and people as well;
如某些生物--蘑菇、蜗牛、水母、蠕虫--进化出生物荧光，人类亦可转寰；
we emit infra-red light from our most lucent selves. Our tragedy is we can't see it.
我们最耀眼的本我散发着红外之光。可悲的是这光芒我们无法看见。
We see by reflecting. We need biofluorescence to show our true colors.
我们只看见它反射的光亮。我们需要生物荧光去展示本来的绚烂。
External illumination can distort, though. When gravity bends light,
只怕外在的光亮会被改变。当引力束缚光线，
huge galaxy clusters can act as telescopes, elongating background images of star systems to faint arcs
浩瀚星群化身为望远镜，将背景星系光芒延展成微弱地弧光--
a lensing effect like viewing distant street lamps through a glass of wine.
引力透镜效应犹如透过一杯酒，遥望远处街上的灯火阑珊。
A glass of wine or two now makes me weave as if acting the drunkard's part;
一两杯酒现在就可让我晕眩好像十足的醉汉一样；
as if, besotted with unrequited love for the dynamic Turner canvasses spied out by the Hubble,
又好像自作多情地用哈勃（望远镜）偷窥特纳笔下动态油画，
I could lurch down a city street set without provoking every pedestrian walk-on stare.
我可以摇晃着走在城市街巷，不招惹往来行人的目光。
Stare as long as you need to.
注视直到你心满意足。
If you think about it, walking, even standing, is illogical -- such tiny things, feet!
你不妨思考一下，行走，甚至站立，都是如此不合逻辑--只凭如此瘦小的东西，双足！
especially when one's body is not al dente anymore.
特别是当某人的身体不再生硬如初。
Besides, creature of extremes and excess,
身体，生物极端而又过量，
I've always thought Apollo beautiful but boring, and a bit of a dumb blonde. Dionysians don't do balance.
我一直认为阿波罗完美，却如漂亮的“花瓶”一样无趣。酒神从不保证平衡。
Balance, in other words, has never been my strong point. But I digress. More and more these days,
平衡，换句话说，从来不在我的优点中。但我却渐渐偏离。在这些日子里越偏越远，
digression seems the most direct route through from where I've lost or found myself out of place, mind, turn, time.
偏离的轨道却仿佛是一条迷失自我、发现自我和无所适从最直接的一条路途。
Place your foot just so, mind how you turn: too swift a swivel can bring you down.
将你的双脚这样摆放，注意你的转向，太过迅捷地转身会让你跌跌撞撞。
Take your time ushering the audience out, saying goodbye to the actors.
耐心地引导观众散场，与演员们道别。
The ghost light is what they call the single bulb hanging above the bare stage in an empty theater.
幽光就是那盏悬在空寂戏院上的孤灯。
In the empty theater of such a night, waking to meet no external radiance,
在这个夜里的空寂戏院中，这里没有任何外在光芒，
this is the final struggle left to win, this the sole beacon to beckon the darkness in and let the rest begin,
这是最后一场需要赢取的较量，这是最后一座孤独的灯塔，引领黑暗侵袭，放任凝静开启，
this the lens through which at last to see both Self and Other arrayed with the bright stain of original sin: lit from within.
这是终于能看清自我与他人的透镜，林立着明亮而污秽的原罪之光；从内部点燃。
And this is the last one. "This Dark Hour"
好了这是最后一首。“黑暗时刻”。
Late summer, 4 A.M.
夏末，拂晓4时。
The rain slows to a stop, dripping still from the broad leaves of blue hostas unseen in the garden's dark.
夜雨渐缓，等待停歇，雨滴依旧沿着宽厚湛蓝的玉簪叶，点滴落在看不见的花园中的深夜里。
Barefoot, careful on the slick slate slabs, I need no light, I know the way, stoop by the mint bed,
光脚走在湿滑的石板路，小心翼翼，无需灯火，路已悉知，屈身在薄荷花圃里，
scoop a fistful of moist earth, then grope for a chair, spread a shawl, and sit, breathing in the wet green August air.
握一捧潮湿的泥土，摸索出一把椅子，解开披肩，坐下，呼吸着八月湿润而绿意浓重的气息。
This is the small, still hour before the newspaper lands in the vestibule like a grenade,
此刻既是渺小，静默的时间，在如手雷般的报纸抛向前厅之前，
the phone shrills, the computer screen blinks and glares awake.
在电话刺耳地响起前，在电脑嗡然地启动前，
There is this hour: poem in my head, soil in my hand: unnamable fullness.
此刻此时，我心存诗意，手握淤泥，无法言说的满足在洋溢。
This hour, when blood of my blood bone of bone, child grown to manhood now
此刻，与我骨肉相连的孩子，历经岁月变成现在的成年男子--
stranger, intimate, not distant but apart -- lies safe, off dreaming melodies while love sleeps, safe, in his arms.
陌生又熟悉，虽不遥远却若即若离--他安详地躺着，沉睡在梦的旋律中，爱，恬静地卧在他的臂弯里。
To have come to this place, lived to this moment: immeasurable lightness.
来过此处，活在此时；无语的轻逸。
The density of black starts to blur umber.
浓重黑夜开始转为迷蒙的棕色晨曦。
Tentative, a cardinal's coloratura, then the mourning dove's elegy.
红雀的花腔游弋飘忽，引得泣鸽悲声响起。
Sable glimmers toward grey; objects emerge, trailing shadows; night ages toward day. The city stirs.
昏暗的微光变成灰白；万物浮现，拖着迷蒙的影子；黑夜转向白日。微动的城市。
There will be other dawns, nights, gaudy noons. Likely, I'll lose my way.
将迎来另一个晨曦、夜晚及花哨的午时。或许，我会迷失。
There will be stumbling, falling, cursing the dark.
甚至是蹒跚、倒地、咒骂黑夜。
Whatever comes, there was this hour when nothing mattered, all was unbearably dear.
无论如何，总有这样的时刻，一切变得无关紧要，一切都可亲可爱。
And when I'm done with daylights, should those who loved me grieve too long a while,
当我与白昼惜别时，那些爱我之人沉湎悲伤时，
let them remember that I had this hour -- this dark, perfect hour -- and smile. Thank you.
让他们记住我曾拥有此时--这个黑暗却完美之时--面带微笑。谢谢大家。