越旅行越裡面

William Stafford是一位已過世的美國詩人，我在豬羅住處翻讀他的詩集，非常非常喜歡。
在1962年出版的Traveling through the Dark裡，48歲的他寫了一首Fall Wind。

Pods of summer crowd around the door;
I take them in the autumn of my hands.

Last night I heard the first cold wind outside;
the wind blew soft, and yet I shiver twice:

Once for thin walls, once for the sound of time.

31年後，1993年8月28號，79歲的他在日記裡寫下最後一首詩：

“Are you Mr. William Stafford?”
“Yes, but …”

Well, it was yesterday.
Sunlight used to follow my hand.
And that’s when the strange siren-like sound flooded
over the horizon and rushed through the streets of our town.
That’s when the sunlight came from behind
a rock and began to follow my hand.

“It’s for the best,” my mother said – “Nothing can
ever be wrong for anyone truly good.”
So later the sun settled back and the sound
faded and was gone. All along the streets every
house waited, white, blue, gray; trees
were still trying to arch as for as they could.

You can’t tell when strange things with meaning
will happen. I’m here writing it down
just the way it was. “You don’t have to
prove anything” my mother said. “Just be ready
for what God sends.” I listened and put my hand
out in the sun again. It was all easy.

Well, it was yesterday. And the sun came,
Why
It came.