Portrait d'une Femme

Your mind and you are our Sargasso Sea,
London has swept about you this score years  
And bright ships left you this or that in fee: (2-3)
Ideas, old gossip, oddments of all things,
Strange spars of knowledge and dimmed wares of price. 5
Great minds have sought you－lacking someone else.
You have been second always. Tragical?
No. You preferred it to the usual thing:
One dull man, dulling and uxorious,
One average mind－with one thought less, each year. 10
Oh, you are patient, I have seen you sit  
Hours, where something might have floated up.  
And now you pay one. Yes, you richly pay.  
You are a person of some interest, one comes to you  
And takes strange gain away: 15 (14-15)
Trophies fished up; some curious suggestion;
Fact that leads nowhere; and a tale or two,  
Pregnant with mandrakes, or with something else
That might prove useful and yet never proves,  
That never fits a corner or shows use, 20
Or finds its hour upon the loom of days:  
The tarnished, gaudy, wonderful old work;
Idols and ambergris and rare inlays,
These are your riches, your great store; and yet  
For all this sea-hoard of deciduous things, 25
Strange woods half sodden, and new brighter stuff:
In the slow float of different light and deep,  
No! there is nothing! In the whole and all,  
Nothing that's quite your own.
            Yet this is you 30

1912

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題解 法文詩題的英譯為Portrait of a Woman. 詩中所述為當代的倫敦人。[back]
1 Sargasso Sea：藻海。在北大西洋中西印度群島東北之海域。因有漂浮之馬尾藻 (sargassum) 而得名。海中的漂流物常漂聚此處，所以用以形容此位女士的心靈，如同雜物聚集的藻海。[back]
2-3 這兩行大意是這二十年中倫敦在你身邊沖掃，鮮艷的船隻留給你這個那個當酬金。即指所得的東西零零碎碎。[back]
4 oddments：零碎物。[back]
5 Strange spars of knowledge：奇異之知識晶石。spars：晶石。dimmed wares of price：暗淡的昂貴商品。[back]
6 lacking someone else：因為缺乏另外的人。指出偉大的心靈來找你，是因為找不到他人之故。[back]
7 You have been second always：指出該女士無論在什麼事上總是差人一等。[back]
8 the usual thing：此處指婚姻而言。[back]
9 uxorious [ ]：過度喜愛或順從妻子的。[back]
10 with one thought less, each year：指這樣一個平凡的男子，年年愈變愈枯燥無味 (duller and duller each year)。[back]
14-15 One comes to you / And . . .away：一個人來到你這兒，並帶走所獲的奇異東西。以下即列出一些好像有點名堂，但事實上卻毫無用處的東西。[back]
16 Trophies：戰利器；紀念品。[back]
18 Pregnant with mandrakes：由曼陀羅而受孕。mandrake又作mandragora，其根分叉，在巫術中代表男性。根可製麻醉劑。[back]
22 tarnished：失去光澤的。gaudy：俗麗的。[back]
23 ambergris：龍涎香。rare inlays：罕有的鑲嵌物。[back]
25 this sea-hoard of deciduous things：hoard意為密藏物，sea-hoard正應第一行Your mind and you are our Sargasso Sea. Deciduous things意為生命短暫的東西。[back]
26 Strange woods half sodden：半浸透的奇形怪狀的木頭。[back]
29 Nothing . . . own：意指該婦人所有的都是些陳腐的東西，沒有真正屬於她自己的東西。[back]

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