Navigating in the Dark英文诗词

张东东

Navigating in the Dark英文诗词

  Navigating in the Dark

  by Erik Campbell

  Papua, Indonesia

  In this mining town in Papua the electricity Has a habit of giving up at night, and this

  Is a miracle of modern stasis, a secular Shabbat,Reminding us of what is expendable, of how so few

  Of us ever truly experience the dark. We are amazed,My wife and I, with the heavy darkness

  Of the no moon jungle, insect sounds lacerating All illusions of silent places. “It‘s so absolute,”

  My wife says, and I like to think she means More than the darkness; the naked places

  Of ourselves we dress in sunlight, lamps,And recorded music like antithetical

  Blanche DeBois‘s fearing a different sort Of scrutiny. “We could pretend it’s 1940,”

  I say, “put a Jack Benny tape on the short wave And drink coffee, light candles.” She suggests

  A walk outside instead, where there are dozens Of others already out on paths bounded by jungle,

  Stepping small and laughing loudly through various Uncertainties; flashlights as eyes, ears like animals‘。

  Soon we are trying only to remember not to disappear Altogether; everything is so absolutely, so darkly possible