秋叶落尽，我们对事物又

After the leaves have fallen, we return

一目了然。这就像

To a plain sense of things. It is as if

我们来到了想象的尽头，

We had come to an end of the imagination,

滞留在一种枯燥的理解里。

Inanimate in an inert savoir.

难以选中哪个形容词来应对

It is difficult even to choose the adjective

这空茫的冷，这莫名的哀。

For this blank cold, this sadness without cause.

鸿篇巨构变成一个小屋，

The great structure has become a minor house.

没有头巾帽走过萎缩了的地板。

No turban walks across the lessened floors.

温室急需油漆一新。

The greenhouse never so badly needed paint.

五十年的烟囱老旧得歪斜。

The chimney is fifty years old and slants to one side.

一种异想天开的努力已经失败，

A fantastic effort has failed, a repetition

只用重复，重复着人和苍蝇。

In a repetitiousness of men and flies.

正是想象力的空缺

Yet the absence of the imagination had

急需被想象。巨大的池塘，急需

Itself to be imagined. The great pond,

明白的体验，既无倒影，落叶，烂泥，

The plain sense of it, without reflections, leaves,

水也不像脏玻璃，满口沉默，只

Mud, water like dirty glass, expressing silence

表达出那种老鼠来偷窥时的沉默。

Of a sort, silence of a rat come out to see,

大池塘和它百合花的残骸，都

The great pond and its waste of the lilies, all this

必须被想象成一种必然的认知，

Had to be imagined as an inevitable knowledge,

一种急需，必不可少的急需。

Required, as a necessity requires.