理查德·泰瑞尔(Richard Terrill,1953-)，美国当代著名诗人。主要作品有：诗集《近乎黑暗》（Almost Dark）和《迟来的拉赫曼尼诺夫》（Coming Late to Rachmaninoff），其中《迟来的拉赫曼尼诺夫》获得明尼苏达州图书奖。传记文学作品《重返爵士之旅》（Fakebook: Improvisations on a Journey Back to Jazz）和《保定周六之夜: 中国回忆录》（Saturday Night in Baoding: A China Memoir），其中《保定周六之夜: 中国回忆录》获得美国传记文学写作奖。泰瑞尔还获得过国家艺术基金会、威斯康辛州和明尼苏达州艺术委员会、杰罗姆基金会、麦克道尔和布莱德洛夫作家大会，以及富布莱特奖学金。他是从曼卡多明尼苏达州立大学荣退的杰出教授，目前是一位爵士乐萨克斯管演奏家，现居美国明尼苏达州。
泰瑞尔于1985-1986年曾在河北大学外文系任教，《保定周六之夜: 中国回忆录》记录的就是那段经历。此次推出的几首诗歌由作者本人选取，由他当年在河大的部分学生翻译，以此重叙师生情谊。在翻译过程中，曾分别经过了泰瑞尔先生和夫人谢凤娟女士的认真修订，在此深表感谢。
【灯塔】
河北大学外文系英语82-2班 从丛 译
母亲握着我的手，
我的妻子在她另一边，
轻轻地踮着脚尖走在海滩上。
她的脚步迈过“顽石”，
踏过一周雨水留下的水坑。
我们走过桦树枝条春天般的芳香。
走十五分钟了——您想
往回走吗？或者二十分钟？
她89岁，已经不识数了。
她希望能够看看她那座
上周卖掉的房子，再看上一眼；她没怎么
抱怨，使我们那个夜晚更加圆满。
您是想这样一直走到灯塔那里去吗？
此刻轻浪打亮岩石。
月亮升起，太阳还未掉落
在大湖上，余辉笼罩
岛上白松的树梢，
还有海岸上灯塔的尖顶，
然后再无其他。
“假如步子迈大一点，
就不用走那么多步了”，她说。
报纸上说，邻居们想
将那座老灯塔拆掉：
它吸引了太多的游客，
人们都跑到他们的海岸上来散步。
“为什么他们想要拆掉
那么好的灯塔？”
妈妈问道。正在此时她看见橘黄色
小花在草中摇曳。“金凤花？”
她曾知晓各种野花，
但现在已经忘掉，她弯下腰
一瞬间，她想起来了，摘下一朵
白色蒲公英，
随后，吹走了种子。
The Lighthouse
My mother holds my hand,
my wife on her other side,
and lightly toes the beach.
She walks over "tricky rocks,"
steps over puddles from a week of rain.
We pass the spring-sweet smell of birch.
Fifteen minutes -- do you
want to turn around now? Twenty?
She's 89 and has lost count.
She wishes she could see her house,
sold last week, one more time; her lack
of complaint complements the evening.
Do you want to walk all the way to the lighthouse?
Now the waves thin to gloss on stones.
The moon is up, the sun not down
over the Great Lake, catching
the tops of white pine on the island,
then the top of the lighthouse on shore,
then nothing.
"If you take bigger steps,
you don't have to take as many," she says.
The paper says the neighbors want
that old lighthouse torn down:
it attracts too many tourists,
people taking walks on their shore.
"Why do they want to tear down
that nice light house?"
Mother asks. Then an orange nodding
flower in the grass. "Buttercup?"
She used to know wildflowers,
but she forgot, bends down
too quickly, remembers, picks
a white dandelion,
and blows the seeds away.
【爱的可能性】
河北大学外文系英语82-2班 程丽英 译
像一抹新奇的色彩出现在我们眼前，
像一个要写信的念头，
像意外发生前的那个早晨。
爱的可能性就像日暮时
沙滩上抖起的毯子在风中飞舞。
爱的可能性像一个小孩。
是一只红色鸟儿心中的春天。
其他的可能性使你走走停停。
爱的可能性是不停工作的假期。
是一场无人组织的竞选，
一场没有输赢的选举，
根本就不是什么选举。
1950年代的威斯康辛（美国中西部州名），
主妇们身穿长长的上衣和鲜艳的围裙
用湿布擦拭晾衣绳。
蓝色的云朵飘过天空。
主妇们挂出来晾晒的
就是爱的可能性。
The Possibility of Love
occurs to us like a new color,
like the idea to write a letter,
occurs like the morning of the accident.
The possibility of love rises like a blanket
shook out after a day at the beach.
The possibility of love is a child.
It’s spring in the mind of one red bird.
Other possibilities make you stop and go.
The possibility of love is a working vacation.
It’s a campaign without a manager,
a campaign with no election,
it is no campaign at all.
In Wisconsin in the 1950’s,
wives in long jackets and bright work dresses
ran damp cloths along clotheslines.
Blue clouds blew by.
What the wives hung out to dry
was the possibility of love.
【鹿，十二月】
河北大学外文系英语82-2班 秦明霞 译
睡不着的三十之一夜
黎明前昏暗中突然
发现窗外紧靠山坡有动静。
我戴上眼镜定睛看
老屋窗玻璃才不再晃闪。
三只，大概二十英尺外，
它们用鼻子在新雪上掘拱，
才刚刚入冬，
枯枝萎叶还没冻硬，
可吃的已是冷炙残羹。
觅食，咀嚼，凝视空中。
它们颈项挺直，仅只因微微
颤动，我想象那是风，
我听不见，即使
在外面和它们一起而不是
像这样暖融融坐在床边。
此时红衣凤头鸟是冬天
映衬着早上6点均匀灰色的红艳
——多云，每年的冬天。我坐在那儿继续看
直到又一次早会迟到，
我的闹钟没响——一定是这样。
我无从知晓也许没什么人会在意我不在席间。
Deer, December
One of thirty nights I can’t sleep
I awaken to motion in the last dark
out the window, tight against the hillside.
I put on my glasses to stop
The glass in old house from wavering.
Three of them, maybe twenty feet away,
they nuzzle new snow,
leaves and twigs not yet frozen hard,
a poor diet, winter just begun.
Foraging, chewing, staring lines into space.
Their necks bolt upright only to the slight
shift in what I imagine is wind,
to things I can’t hear, couldn’t,
were I with them outside and not still
warm on the edge of the bed.
Then a cardinal is winter
red against the even gray of 6 a.m.
—cloudy, this time of year. I’ll stay watching
until I’m late for another morning meeting,
my alarm clock not gone off—that must be it.
I can’t know how little I’ll be missed.
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