2

“AH, poet, the evening draws near; your hair is turning grey.

“Do you in your lonely musing hear the message of the hereafter?”

“It is evening,” the poet said, “and I am listening because some one may call from the village, late though it be. “I watch if young straying hearts meet together, and two pairs of eager eyes beg for music to break their silence and speak for them.

“Who is there to weave their passionate songs, if I sit on the shore of life and contemplate death and the beyond?

“The early evening star disappears.

“The glow of a funeral pyre slowly dies by the silent river.

“Jackals cry in chorus from the courtyard of the deserted house in the light of the worn-out moon.

“If some wanderer, leaving home, come here to watch the night and with bowed head listen to the murmur of the darkness, who is there to whisper the secrets of life into his ears if I, shutting my doors, should try to free myself from mortal bonds?

“It is a trifle that my hair is turning grey.

“I am ever as young or as old as the youngest and the oldest of this village.

“Some have smiles, sweet and simple, and some a sly twinkle in their eyes.

“Some have tears that well up in the daylight, and others tears that are hidden in the gloom.

“They all have need for me, and I have no time to brood over the afterlife.

“I am of an age with each, what matter if my hair turns grey?”

2

“啊，诗人，夜晚渐临；你的头发已经变白。

你在孤寂的沉思中听到了来生的消息吗？”

“是夜晚了。”诗人说，“夜虽已晚，

我还在静听，因为也许有人会从村中呼唤。

我看守着，是否有年轻的飘游的心聚在一起，

两对渴望的眼睛切求有音乐来打破他们的沉默，

并替他们说话。

如果我坐在生命的岸边默想着死亡和来世，

又有谁来编写他们的热情的诗歌呢？

“早现的晚星消隐了。

火葬灰中的红光在沉静的河边慢慢地熄灭下去。

残月的微光下，胡狼从空宅的庭院里齐声嗥叫。

假如有游子们离了家，

到这里来守夜，低头静听黑暗的微语，

有谁把生命的秘密向他耳边低诉呢，

如果我关起门户，企图摆脱世俗的牵缠？

“我的头发变白是一件小事。

我是永远和这村里最年轻的人一样年轻，

最年老的人一样年老。

有的人发出甜柔单纯的微笑，

有的人眼里含着狡狯的闪光。

有的人在白天流涌着眼泪，

有的人的眼泪却隐藏在幽暗里。

他们都需要我，我没有时间去冥想来生。

我和每一个人都是同年的，

我的头发变白了又该怎样呢？”