My Dolphin, you only guide me by surprise,

我的海豚[1]，你只出人意料地引导我，

a captive as Racine, the man of craft,

一个俘虏，就像拉辛，那善于构思的人，

drawn through his maze of iron composition

被淮德拉[2]无与伦比的缭绕声音

by the incomparable wandering voice of Phèdre.

引入他自己用钢铁构造的迷宫。

When I was troubled in mind, you made for my body

我那时精神苦恼，身体给下沉的绳索中

caught in its hangman's-knot of sinking lines,

刽子手打的结缠住，我的意志

the glassy bowing and scraping of my will. . . .

木然地打躬作揖，你向我游来....

I have sat and listened to too many

我曾坐下倾听太多

words of the collaborating muse,

合作的灵感的话语，

and plotted perhaps too freely with my life,

过于自由地策划我的生活，

not avoiding injury to others,

没有避免伤害他人，

not avoiding injury to myself—

没有避免伤害自己──

to ask compassion . . . this book, half fiction,

向怜悯开口...这本书，属半小说类，

an eelnet made by man for the eel fighting

一张人造的用来与鳗鱼周旋的捕鳗网──

我的眼睛看到了我的手的所为。

my eyes have seen what my hand did.

译注：

[1]：洛厄尔曾说他的第三任妻子卡萝莱.布赖克伍德（Caroline Blackwood）救了他的命，所以称她为“海豚”。

[2]：法国古典剧作家拉辛的悲剧《淮德拉》（1677）中的女主角，洛厄尔曾翻译过此剧。