當我們走下變白的木製台階
來到海灘並仰面躺在
藍白色的輕便馬車上
靠近水邊
在地圖中那小點之上，
這大海運動夾克上的一個紐扣，
一男一女
我們幾乎
無事能做。

整個上午我們觀賞雲朵
在頭頂滾動
或閉目養神
聊來侃去，
聲音被沉悶單調的海浪拉平
言詞在風中奇特地翻筋頭。

這是復活節前的星期五，
距任一大陸都幾百英里
離耶穌受難地幾千英里。
野芙蓉沿着路邊纏繞，
黃腹鳥唱着它的名字，
所有的店鋪都關閉了
因為今天是做熱十字小麵包
和在海灘放飛風箏的日子—
去吃這香甜的十字架
用線繩將十字架固定在天空裡。

白色的沙變熱了
當我們中的一人指出了地平線上
那個豬嘴，和那上方張口的
鱷魚泰然自若的要吃一小片雲朵。

瞧那是個多麼巨大的腦袋，
象那魔鬼戴着眼鏡
你說，我卻背對太陽合上眼睛
只能聽見你的話語
被輕輕海風柔弱翹曲，
告訴我這腦袋如何變為一輛自行車，
大車輪子站在遊戲紙牌上，
當海水沖入，落回—
彈子無窮盡地傾瀉到大理石地面—
而我倆竟如此平靜
這似乎不是我們僅有的生活
只是系列中的一個，一手鐲上的飾物，

仿佛每天我們都不是在跑
象那海灘上孤獨的奔跑者
朝向沒有形狀或波浪的黑暗
朝向十字架或雲朵，

好象我們中的一個不可能先到那裡
落在其他人的後面，
遺棄在一個荒島上
沒有粉色房子和藍色格窗，
沒有李子色配飾着奶油色，
沒有海面上的礁石將波浪爆裂成泡沫，
也沒有熟悉的聲音在風中翹曲。

Bermuda

When we walk down the bleached-out wooden stairs
to the beach and lie on our backs
on the blue and white chaises
near the edge of the water
on this dot in the atlas,
this single button on the blazer of the sea,
we come about as close
as a man and a woman can
to doing nothing.

All morning long we watch the clouds
roll overhead
or close our eyes and do the lazy
back-and-forth of talk,
our voices flattened by the drone of surf,
our words tumbling oddly in the wind.

It's Good Friday here, hundreds of miles
from any mass of land,
thousands from Calvary.
Wild hibiscus twists along the roadsides,
the yellow-breasted bird sings its name,
and all the stores are closed
because today is the day to make hot cross buns
and fly kites from the beaches—
to eat the sweet cross,
to fix with a string a cross in the sky.

The white sand heats up
as one of us points out the snout of a pig
on the horizon, and higher up
a gaping alligator poised to eat a smaller cloud.

See how that one is a giant head,
like the devil wearing glasses
you say, but my eyes are shut against the sun
and I only hear your words,
softened and warped by the sea breeze,

telling me how the head is becoming a bicycle,
the high-wheel kind on playing cards,
while the sea rushes in, falls back—
marbles pouring endlessly onto a marble floor—

and the two of us so calm
it seems that this is not our only life,
just one in a series, charms on a bracelet,

as if every day we were not running
like the solitary runners on the beach
toward a darkness without shape
or waves, crosses or clouds,

as if one of us is not likely to get there first
leaving the other behind,
castaway on an island
with no pink houses or blue shutters,
no plum-colored ones trimmed in cream,
no offshore reef to burst the waves into foam,
and no familiar voice being bent in the wind.

----By Billy Collins