Chaplinesque -- Hart Crane (1899-1932)

卓別林扮相

我們乖乖調適自己，
慰藉時有時無，足矣...
＊　　　　＊　　　　＊
這一局，也只能苦笑了；
但我們曾見，月映孤巷，
空垃圾桶也能看成聖杯，且笑聲盈杯。
一切嘻笑過後，一切尋覓過後，
荒野中，仔貓哭號。

slithered: well worn, hence slithered
deposits: lets fall; drops
too ample: stuffed with odds and ends
famished: starved; hungry
recesses: places to hide
elbow coverts: protective patches at the elbow of a (usually old-fashioned) jacket
smirk: a forced smile
dally: to act playfully; to deal with lightly
that inevitable thumb: the thumb of Death
puckered index: wrinkled index finger
squint: a side glance
obsequies: a funeral or burial rite, usually used in plural
the pirouettes of any pliant cane: referring to Charlie Chapline's act with his cane
We can evade "you": kept ambiguous (therefore beautiful and poetic) in three possibilities--Death, the reader, or an obscure fear



We make our meek adjustments,
Contented with such random consolations
As the wind deposits
In slithered and too ample pockets.

For we can still love the world, who find
A famished kitten on the step, and know
Recesses for it from the fury of the street,
Or warm torn elbow coverts.

We will sidestep, and to the final smirk
Dally the doom of that inevitable thumb
That slowly chafes its puckered index toward us,
Facing the dull squint with what innocence
And what surprise!

And yet these fine collapses are not lies
More than the pirouettes of any pliant cane;
Our obsequies are, in a way, no enterprise.
We can evade you, and all else but the heart:
What blame to us if the heart live on.

The game enforces smirks; but we have seen
The moon in lonely alleys make
A grail of laughter of an empty ash can,
And through all sound of gaiety and quest
Have heard a kitten in the wilderness.