STREET LAMPS

      GOLD, with an innermost speck¹

     Of silver, singing afloat

         Beneath the night,

     Like balls of thistle-down

     Wandering up and down

     Over the whispering town

         Seeking where to alight!

 

     Slowly, above the street

     Above the ebb² of feet

         Drifting in flight;

     Still, in the purple distance

     The gold of their strange persistence³

     As they cross and part and meet

         And pass out of sight!

 

     The seed-ball of the sun

     Is broken at last, and done

         Is the orb⁴ of day.

     Now to the separate ends

     Seed after day-seed wends

         A separate way.

 

     No sun will ever rise

     Again on the wonted skies

         In the midst of the spheres.

     The globe of the day, over-ripe,

     Is shattered at last beneath the stripe

     Of the wind, and its oneness veers⁵

         Out myriad-wise.

 

     Seed after seed after seed

     Drifts over the town, in its need

         To sink and have done;

     To settle at last in the dark,

     To bury its weary spark

         Where the end is begun.

 

     Darkness, and depth of sleep,

     Nothing to know or to weep

         Where the seed sinks in

     To the earth of the under-night

     Where all is silent, quite

     Still, and the darknesses steep

         Out all the sin.

     "SHE SAID AS WELL TO ME"

 

     SHE said as well to me: "Why are you ashamed?

     That little bit of your chest that shows between

     the gap of your shirt, why cover it up?

     Why shouldn't your legs and your good strong

        thighs⁶

     be rough and hairy?—I'm glad they are like

        that.

     You are shy, you silly, you silly shy thing.

     Men are the shyest creatures, they never will come

     out of their covers. Like any snake

     slipping into its bed of dead leaves, you hurry into

        your clothes.

     And I love you so! Straight and clean and all of a

        piece is the body of a man,

     such an instrument, a spade, like a spear, or an

        oar⁷,

     such a joy to me—"

     So she laid her hands and pressed them down my

        sides,

     so that I began to wonder over myself, and what I

        was.

 

     She said to me: "What an instrument, your

        body!

     single and perfectly⁸ distinct from everything else!

     What a tool in the hands of the Lord!

     Only God could have brought it to its shape.

     It feels as if his handgrasp, wearing you

     had polished you and hollowed you,

     hollowed this groove⁹ in your sides, grasped you

        under the breasts

     and brought you to the very quick of your form,

     subtler than an old, soft-worn fiddle-bow.

 

     "When I was a child, I loved my father's riding-

        whip

     that he used so often.

     I loved to handle it, it seemed like a near part of

        him.

     So I did his pens, and the jasper seal on his desk.

     Something seemed to surge through me when I

        touched them.

 

     "So it is with you, but here

     The joy I feel!

     God knows what I feel, but it is joy!

     Look, you are clean and fine and singled out!

     I admire you so, you are beautiful: this clean

        sweep of your sides, this firmness, this hard

        mould!

     I would die rather than have it injured with one

        scar.

     I wish I could grip you like the fist of the Lord,

        and have you—"

 

     So she said, and I wondered,

     feeling trammelled and hurt.

     It did not make me free.

 

     Now I say to her: "No tool, no instrument, no

        God!

     Don't touch me and appreciate me.

     It is an infamy¹⁰.

     You would think twice before you touched a

        weasel on a fence

     as it lifts its straight white throat.

     Your hand would not be so flig and easy.

     Nor the adder¹¹ we saw asleep with her head on her

        shoulder,

     curled up in the sunshine like a princess;

     when she lifted her head in delicate, startled

        wonder

     you did not stretch forward to caress¹² her

     though she looked rarely beautiful

     and a miracle as she glided¹³ delicately away, with

        such dignity.

     And the young bull in the field, with his wrinkled,

        sad face,

     you are afraid if he rises to his feet,

     though he is all wistful and pathetic, like a mono-

        lith, arrested, static.

 

     "Is there nothing in me to make you hesitate?

     I tell you there is all these.

     And why should you overlook them in me?—"

 

1 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。

2 ebb   

vi.衰退，减退；n.处于低潮，处于衰退状态

参考例句：

• The flood and ebb tides alternates with each other.涨潮和落潮交替更迭。
• They swam till the tide began to ebb.他们一直游到开始退潮。

3 persistence   

n.坚持，持续，存留

参考例句：

• The persistence of a cough in his daughter puzzled him.他女儿持续的咳嗽把他难住了。
• He achieved success through dogged persistence.他靠着坚持不懈取得了成功。

4 orb   

n.太阳；星球；v.弄圆；成球形

参考例句：

• The blue heaven,holding its one golden orb,poured down a crystal wash of warm light.蓝蓝的天空托着金色的太阳，洒下一片水晶般明亮温暖的光辉。
• It is an emanation from the distant orb of immortal light.它是从远处那个发出不灭之光的天体上放射出来的。

5 veers   

v.（尤指交通工具）改变方向或路线( veer的第三人称单数 )；（指谈话内容、人的行为或观点）突然改变；（指风） （在北半球按顺时针方向、在南半球按逆时针方向）逐渐转向；风向顺时针转

参考例句：

• The car veers out of control. 这辆车失去了控制。 来自辞典例句
• His fondness for his characters sometimes veers towards the sentimental. 他对那位主人公的偏爱有时也稍显矫情。 来自互联网

6 thighs   

n.股，大腿( thigh的名词复数 )；食用的鸡（等的）腿

参考例句：

• He's gone to London for skin grafts on his thighs. 他去伦敦做大腿植皮手术了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The water came up to the fisherman's thighs. 水没到了渔夫的大腿。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 oar   

n.桨，橹，划手；v.划行

参考例句：

• The sailors oar slowly across the river.水手们慢慢地划过河去。
• The blade of the oar was bitten off by a shark.浆叶被一条鲨鱼咬掉了。

8 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

9 groove   

n.沟，槽；凹线，（刻出的）线条，习惯

参考例句：

• They're happy to stay in the same old groove.他们乐于墨守成规。
• The cupboard door slides open along the groove.食橱门沿槽移开。

10 infamy   

n.声名狼藉，出丑，恶行

参考例句：

• They may grant you power,honour,and riches but afflict you with servitude,infamy,and poverty.他们可以给你权力、荣誉和财富，但却用奴役、耻辱和贫穷来折磨你。
• Traitors are held in infamy.叛徒为人所不齿。

11 adder   

n.蝰蛇；小毒蛇

参考例句：

• The adder is Britain's only venomous snake.蝰蛇是英国唯一的一种毒蛇。
• An adder attacked my father.一条小毒蛇攻击了我父亲。

12 caress   

vt./n.爱抚，抚摸

参考例句：

• She gave the child a loving caress.她疼爱地抚摸着孩子。
• She feasted on the caress of the hot spring.她尽情享受着温泉的抚爱。

13 glided   

v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔

参考例句：

• The President's motorcade glided by. 总统的车队一溜烟开了过去。
• They glided along the wall until they were out of sight. 他们沿着墙壁溜得无影无踪。 来自《简明英汉词典》