Daddy
2008-10-17 14:01:00
Daddy
by Sylvia Plath
You do not do, you do not do
Any more, black shoe
In which I have lived like a foot
For thirty years, poor and white,
Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.
Daddy, I have had to kill you.
You died before I had time--
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
Ghastly statue with one gray toe
Big as a Frisco seal
And a head in the freakish Atlantic
Where it pours bean green over blue
In the waters off beautiful Nauset.
I used to pray to recover you.
Ach, du.
In the German tongue, in the Polish town
Scraped flat by the roller
Of wars, wars, wars.
But the name of the town is common.
My Polack friend
Says there are a dozen or two.
So I never could tell where you
Put your foot, your root,
I never could talk to you.
The tongue stuck in my jaw.
It stuck in a barb wire snare.
Ich, ich, ich, ich,
I could hardly speak.
I thought every German was you.
And the language obscene
An engine, an engine
Chuffing me off like a Jew.
A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.
I began to talk like a Jew.
I think I may well be a Jew.
The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna
Are not very pure or true.
With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck
And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack
I may be a bit of a Jew.
I have always been scared of you,
With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo.
And your neat mustache
And your Aryan eye, bright blue.
Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You--
Not God but a swastika
So black no sky could squeak through.
Every woman adores a Fascist,
The boot in the face, the brute
Brute heart of a brute like you.
You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
In the picture I have of you,
A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
But no less a devil for that, no not
Any less the black man who
Bit my pretty red heart in two.
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.
But they pulled me out of the sack,
And they stuck me together with glue.
And then I knew what to do.
I made a model of you,
A man in black with a Meinkampf look
And a love of the rack and the screw.
And I said I do, I do.
So daddy, I'm finally through.
The black telephone's off at the root,
The voices just can't worm through.
If I've killed one man, I've killed two--
The vampire who said he was you
And drank my blood for a year,
Seven years, if you want to know.
Daddy, you can lie back now.
There's a stake in your fat black heart
And the villagers never liked you.
They are dancing and stamping on you.
They always knew it was you.
Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through.
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爹地
作者:普拉斯
你再不能這麼做，再不能，
你是黑色的鞋子
我象只腳，關在裏面
蒼白，可憐，受三十年苦
不敢打嚏，氣不敢出。
爹地，我早該殺了你，
我還沒動手你就死去——
大理石般沉重，一袋子神靈
鬼一般的雕像，一個腳趾灰色
象弗裏斯柯的海狗一樣大
像一顆沉浮於怪異大西洋中的頭顱
在那裏海水把綠豆芽拋上藍天
在美麗的瑙塞河外的海水裏。
我曾祈求能尋回你。
啊,你。
說德國話，住波蘭城
那個被戰爭，戰爭，戰爭
碾壓磨平的小城。
但這地名太普通
我的波蘭籍朋友
說有一兩打之多。
所以我從來不清楚
你住在哪里，到過何處。
我從來沒能跟你說話
舌頭在嘴裏卡住，
膠著於鐵蒺藜的陷阱裏。
我，我，我，我
我幾乎說不出話。
我覺得每個德國人都是你
這淫穢的語言
象一架引擎，一架引擎
把我當猶太人一般發落。
該去達豪、達斯威茲、倍爾森的猶太人。
我開始象猶太人一般談吐
我想我可以成為猶太人。
提洛爾的雪，維也納的白啤酒
都不純粹真實。
以我的吉蔔賽血緣和詭異的運道
加上我的塔洛紙牌，我的塔洛紙牌
我真有幾分像猶太人呢。
我始終畏懼你，
你的德國空軍，你的德國武士。
你整齊的短髭，
和你印歐語族的眼睛，明澈的藍。
裝甲隊員，裝甲隊員，啊你──
不是上帝，而是一個 字，
如此黝黑就是天空也無法呼嘯而過。
每一個女人都崇拜法西斯主義者，
長靴踩在臉上，野蠻
野蠻如你一般獸性的心。
你站在黑板旁邊，爹地，
我有這麼一張你的照片，
一道裂痕深深刻入顎部而不在腳上
但還是同樣的魔鬼，一點也不
遜于那曾把我美好赤紅的心
從中擊破的黑人。
你下葬那年我十歲。
二十歲時我就試圖自殺
想回到，回到，回到你的身邊。
我以為屍骨也是一樣的。
但是他們把我拖離此一劫數，
還用膠水將我粘合。
之後我知道該怎麼做。
我塑造了一尊你的偶像，
一個帶著《我的奮鬥》眼神的黑衣人
一個拷問台和螺旋鈕的愛好者。
我說著我願意，我願意。
所以爹地，我終於完了。
黑色的電話線斷了，
聲音就是無法爬行而過。
如果說我已殺了一個人，我就等於殺了兩個──
那吸血鬼說他就是你
並且啜飲我的血已一年，
實際是七年，如果你真想知道。
爹地，你現在可以安息了。
你肥胖的黑心裏藏有一把利刃
村民們從來就沒有喜歡過你
他們在你身上舞蹈踐踏。
而他們很清楚那就是你。
爹地，爹地，你這渾球，我完了。
Alvarez曾說“排除其它因素，这是一首爱之诗（a love poem）”
