背叛

当你偶然撞见你的情人和你的朋友
在你床上赤裸沉睡或只是躺着
你大概会有话要说。

要说的不是再见。
你将永远不会关上那扇被笨拙地打开的门，
他们将永远困在那个房间。

但他们为何非得如此赤裸？
如此缺乏体面？
像在一洼泉水里苦苦挣扎？

腿太细长，腰太粗，
到处都乱糟糟，
一团团毛发……

是的，那是一次背叛，
但不是背叛你。
只是背叛了你对他们的

某些想法，那种柔光的且神秘的，
带着细细筛落的雪
还有十二月淡紫色的黄昏—

不是这种笨拙的瞬间，
这种弯折凸起的身躯，
骤然暴露在你瞪视的目光之中。

作者 / [加拿大]玛格丽特·阿特伍德
翻译 / 李琬
选自 / 《穿过一无所有的空气》，新经典文库

Betrayal

When you stumble across your lover and your friend
naked in or on your bed
there are things that might be said.

Goodbye is not one of them.
You’ll never close that clumsily opened door,
they’ll be stuck in that room forever.

But did they have to be so naked?
So minus grace?
Floundering around as if in a spring puddle?

The legs too spindly, the waists too thick,
the flubbers here and there,
the tufts of hair . . .

Yes, it was a betrayal,
but not of you.
Only of some idea you’d had

of them, soft-lit and mystic,
with snowfall sifting down
and a mauve December sunset—

not this gauche flash,
this flesh akimbo,
caught in the glare of your stare.

Margaret Atwood