MARTYR À LA MODE

     AH God, life, law, so many names you keep,

     You great, you patient Effort, and you Sleep

     That does inform this various dream of living,

     You sleep stretched out for ever, ever giving

     Us out as dreams, you august Sleep

     Coursed round by rhythmic¹ movement of all

        time,

 

     The constellations², your great heart, the sun

     Fierily pulsing, unable to refrain;

     Since you, vast, outstretched, wordless Sleep

     Permit of no beyond, ah you, whose dreams

     We are, and body of sleep, let it never be said

     I quailed³ at my appointed function, turned poltroon⁴

 

     For when at night, from out the full surcharge

     Of a day's experience, sleep does slowly draw

     The harvest, the spent action to itself;

     Leaves me unburdened to begin again;

     At night, I say, when I am gone in sleep,

     Does my slow heart rebel, do my dead hands

     Complain of what the day has had them do?

 

     Never let it be said I was poltroon

     At this my task of living, this my dream,

     This me which rises from the dark of sleep

     In white flesh robed to drape another dream,

     As lightning comes all white and trembling

     From out the cloud of sleep, looks round about

     One moment, sees, and swift its dream is over,

     In one rich drip it sinks to another sleep,

     And sleep thereby⁵ is one more dream enrichened.

 

     If so the Vast, the God, the Sleep that still grows

          richer

     Have said that I, this mote⁶ in the body of sleep

     Must in my transiency pass all through pain,

     Must be a dream of grief, must like a crude

     Dull meteorite⁷ flash only into light

     When tearing through the anguish⁸ of this life,

     Still in full flight extinct, shall I then turn

     Poltroon, and beg the silent, outspread God

     To alter my one speck⁹ of doom¹⁰, when round me

          burns

     The whole great conflagration¹¹ of all life,

     Lapped like a body close upon a sleep,

     Hiding and covering in the eternal Sleep

     Within the immense and toilsome life-time,

          heaved

     With ache of dreams that body forth¹² the Sleep?

 

     Shall I, less than the least red grain of flesh

     Within my body, cry out to the dreaming soul

     That slowly labours in a vast travail¹³,

     To halt the heart, divert the streaming flow

     That carries moons along, and spare the stress

     That crushes me to an unseen atom of fire?

 

     When pain and all

     And grief are but the same last wonder, Sleep

     Rising to dream in me a small keen dream

     Of sudden anguish, sudden over and spent—

 

       CROYDON

 该作者的其它作品
《恋爱中的女人 Women in Love》

《儿子与情人 Sons and Lovers》
《The White Peacock白孔雀》

1 rhythmic   

adj.有节奏的，有韵律的

参考例句：

• Her breathing became more rhythmic.她的呼吸变得更有规律了。
• Good breathing is slow,rhythmic and deep.健康的呼吸方式缓慢深沉而有节奏。

2 constellations   

n.星座( constellation的名词复数 )；一群杰出人物；一系列（相关的想法、事物）；一群（相关的人）

参考例句：

• The map of the heavens showed all the northern constellations. 这份天体图标明了北半部所有的星座。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• His time was coming, he would move in the constellations of power. 他时来运转，要进入权力中心了。 来自教父部分

3 quailed   

害怕，发抖，畏缩( quail的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• I quailed at the danger. 我一遇到危险，心里就发毛。
• His heart quailed before the enormous pyramidal shape. 面对这金字塔般的庞然大物，他的心不由得一阵畏缩。 来自英汉文学

4 poltroon   

n.胆怯者；懦夫

参考例句：

• You are a poltroon to abuse your strength.你是一个滥用武力的懦夫。
• He is more poltroon than cautious.与其说他谨慎，不如说他是怯懦。

5 thereby   

adv.因此，从而

参考例句：

• I have never been to that city,,ereby I don't know much about it.我从未去过那座城市，因此对它不怎么熟悉。
• He became a British citizen,thereby gaining the right to vote.他成了英国公民，因而得到了投票权。

6 mote   

n.微粒；斑点

参考例句：

• Seeing the mote in one's neighbor's eye,but not the beam in one's own.能看见别人眼里的尘埃，看不见自己眼里的木头。
• The small mote on her forehead distinguishes her from her twin sister.她额头上的这个小斑点是她与其双胞胎妹妹的区别。

7 meteorite   

n.陨石；流星

参考例句：

• The meteorite in Jilin Exhibition Hall is believed to be the largest in the world.吉林展览馆的陨石被认为是世界上最大的。
• The famous Murchison meteorite smashed into the Australian ground in 1969.1969年著名的默奇森陨石轰然坠落在澳大利亚。

8 anguish   

n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼

参考例句：

• She cried out for anguish at parting.分手时，她由于痛苦而失声大哭。
• The unspeakable anguish wrung his heart.难言的痛苦折磨着他的心。

9 speck   

n.微粒，小污点，小斑点

参考例句：

• I have not a speck of interest in it.我对它没有任何兴趣。
• The sky is clear and bright without a speck of cloud.天空晴朗，一星星云彩也没有。

10 doom   

n.厄运，劫数；v.注定，命定

参考例句：

• The report on our economic situation is full of doom and gloom.这份关于我们经济状况的报告充满了令人绝望和沮丧的调子。
• The dictator met his doom after ten years of rule.独裁者统治了十年终于完蛋了。

11 conflagration   

n.建筑物或森林大火

参考例句：

• A conflagration in 1947 reduced 90 percent of the houses to ashes.1947年的一场大火，使90%的房屋化为灰烬。
• The light of that conflagration will fade away.这熊熊烈火会渐渐熄灭。

12 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

13 travail   

n.阵痛；努力

参考例句：

• Mothers know the travail of giving birth to a child.母亲们了解分娩时的痛苦。
• He gained the medal through his painful travail.他通过艰辛的努力获得了奖牌。