Plath: Pheasant

Sylvia Plath Collected Poems
No. 162

　　　Pheasant

You said you would kill it this morning.
Do not kill it. It startles me still,
The jut of that odd, dark head, pacing

Through the uncut grass on the elm's hill.
It is something to own a pheasant,
Or just to be visited at all.

I am not mystical: it isn't
As if I thought it had a spirit.
It is simply in its element.

That gives it a kingliness, a right.
The print of its big foot last winter,
The tail-track, on the snow in our court—

The wonder of it, in that pallor,
Through crosshatch of sparrow and starling.
Is it its rareness, then? It is rare.

But a dozen would be worth having,
A hundred, on that hill—green and red,
Crossing and recrossing: a fine thing!

It is such a good shape, so vivid.
It's a little cornucopia.
It unclaps, brown as a leaf, and loud,

Settles in the elm, and is easy.
It was sunning in the narcissi.
I trespass stupidly. Let be, let be.
　　　　　　　　　　　　　　7 April 1962


普拉斯《诗全编》
第162首

　　　野鸡

你说你会在今天早晨将它杀掉。
不要杀吧。它至今仍令我震惊，
那奇怪的黑头顶上的突起，缓步

穿过榆树山上没人修剪的草坪。
拥有一只野鸡，算是有点特别，
哪怕只是供人参观。

我不信什么神秘主义：它也并非
如我所想象的那样拥有灵魂。
那只是在于它的元素。

那赋予它一种君王的威严，一种权利。
去年冬天，它大脚的印记，
尾巴的痕迹，在我们院子的雪上——

它的惊艳，带着那样的苍白，
映衬着麻雀与八哥交叉飞过的阴影。
这不正是它的难得么？它确实难得。

但一打之数还是值得拥有，
一百只，在那座小山上——有绿有红，
走来又走去：一种优美的生灵！

它有那么美妙的身形，如此生动。
它是一只小小的丰饶角。
它扑闪着收起翅膀，有叶子的褐色，嘹亮，

栖息在榆树上，怡然自得。
它在水仙丛中晒太阳。
我傻兮兮地侵入。放过它，放过它。
　　　　　　　　　　　1962年4月7日