H. D. 诗节选给年末

[4]

There is a spell, for instance, in every sea-shell:

continuous, the sea thrust is powerless against coral,

bone, stone, marble hewn from within by that craftsman,

the shell-fish: oyster, clam, mollusc

is master-mason planning the stone marvel:

yet that flabby, amorphous hermit within, like the planet

senses the finite, it limits its orbit

of being, its house, temple, fane, shrine:

it unlocks the portals at stated intervals:

prompted by hunger, it opens the tide-flow:

but infinity? no, of nothing-too-much:

I sense my own limit, my shell-jaws snap shut

at invasion of the limitless, ocean-weight; infinite water

can not crack me, egg in egg-shell; closed in, complete, immortal

full-circle, I know the pull of the tide, the lull

as well as the moon; the octopus-darkness

is powerless against her cold immortality;

so I in my own way know that the whale

can not digest me: be firm in your own small, static, limited

orbit and the shark-jaws of outer circumstance

will spit you forth: be indigestible, hard, ungiving,

so that, living within, you beget, self-out-of-self,

selfless, that pearl-of-great-price.

(From The Walls Do Not Fall, 1944)