共情——在2017年1月20日之前

Empathy—died sometime before

的某个时刻死了。大门消失了，而

January 20,2017. The gate vanished

我们却不知道是在什么时候。门铃

But we don’t know when. The doorbell

消失。火车停运。有人偷了“北极”

Vanished.The trains stopped moving.

的标志。我是你，是你，还有你。

Someone stole the North Pole sign. I

但横在我们中间的有太多的障碍。

am you, and you, and you. But there

我永远无法感受到母亲的病痛或是

are so many obstacles between

父亲的痴呆。乐谱上的黑色音符只

us. I can never feel my mother’s

代表了声音，琴键必须敲击特定的

illness or my father’s dementia. The

琴弦，而琴弦是由钢丝制成的，而

black notes on the score are only

钢丝是由地下得来的铁和碳冶炼而

representations of sound, the keys

成。我们为什么要制造钢琴这样的

must knock certain strings which are

事物来表现美或痛？我们为什么要

made of steel, steel is made of iron

画下看到的事物？谈到绘画，母亲

and carbon from the earth. Why do

常说：“临摹就行。”艺术家只是探

we make things like a piano that try

访了痛并去想象它。我们赞美的是

to represent beauty or pain? Why

艺术家，而不是苹果，也不是正被

must we always draw what we see?

慢慢谋杀的苹果的影子。一定有某

Just copy it, my mother used to say

种作画的方式，让画不至于成为一

about drawing. The artist is only

首挽歌。

visiting pain, imagining it. We praise

the artist, not the apple, not the

apple’s shadow which is murdered

slowly. There must be some way of

drawing a picture so that it doesn’t

become an elegy.