正文
在八月的早晨我可以点数早晨的
牵牛花，那里死去有一个意义，
而没有什么引擎能转变我的视角。
一尘不染，感谢上帝，我的月亮依然是天空的女王
当她盈亏圆缺，一个令人望而惊叹的存在，
她的老人，由粗砂而非蛋白质构成，
依然造访我的奥地利私产
带着他古老的超然，而古老的警告
依然有惊吓我的力量：狂妄会抵达
一个丑陋的结局，不敬
是一个比迷信更大的白痴。
我们的apparatniks[3]将继续制造
惯常的肮脏杂烩，名为历史：
我们能够恳求的只是艺术家，
厨师和圣人们仍可以显得漠不关心。
作者 /
[美国]W.H.奥登
翻译 / 陈东飚
[1] 德语：“人性的”。
[2] Wernher von Braun（1912-1977），著名的火箭发明家和太空探险者。二战时主导纳粹德国的V2火箭计划，战后作为“头脑财富”来到美国，1969年主持了“阿波罗”登月行动。
[3] 俄语“аппаратных”（硬件）的音译。
Moon Landing
It's natural the Boys should whoop it up for
so huge a phallic triumph, an adventure
it would not have occurred to women
to think worth while, made possible only
because we like huddling in gangs and knowing
the exact time: yes, our sex may in fairness
hurrah the deed, although the motives
that primed it were somewhat less than menschlich.
A grand gesture. But what does it period?
What does it osse? We were always adroiter
with objects than lives, and more facile
at courage than kindness: from the moment
the first flint was flaked this landing was merely
a matter of time. But our selves, like Adam's,
still don't fit us exactly, modern
only in this---our lack of decorum.
Homer's heroes were certainly no braver
than our Trio, but more fortunate: Hector
was excused the insult of having
his valor covered by television.
Worth going to see? I can well believe it.
Worth seeing? Mneh! I once rode through a desert
and was not charmed: give me a watered
lively garden, remote from blatherers
about the New, the von Brauns and their ilk, where
on August mornings I can count the morning
glories where to die has a meaning,
and no engine can shift my perspective.
Unsmudged, thank God, my Moon still queens the Heavens
as She ebbs and fulls, a Presence to glop at,
Her Old Man, made of grit not protein,
still visits my Austrian several
with His old detachment, and the old warnings
still have power to scare me: Hybris comes to
an ugly finish, Irreverence
is a greater oaf than Superstition.
Our apparatniks will continue making
the usual squalid mess called History:
all we can pray for is that artists,
chefs and saints may still appear to blithe it.
