Nineteen Thirty-Eight
Charles Simic

That was the year the Nazis marched into Vienna,
Superman made his debut in Action Comics,
Stalin was killing off his fellow revolutionaries,
The first Dairy Queen opened in Kankakee, Ill.,
As I lay in my crib peeing in my diapers.
“You must have been a beautiful baby,” Bing Crosby sang.
A pilot the newspapers called Wrong Way Corrigan
Took off from New York heading for California
And landed instead in Ireland, as I watched my mother
Take a breast out of her blue robe and come closer.
There was a hurricane that September causing a movie theater
At Westhampton Beach to be lifted out to sea.
People worried the world was about to end.
A fish believed to have been extinct for seventy million years
Came up in a fishing net off the coast of South Africa.
I lay in my crib as the days got shorter and colder,
And the first heavy snow fell in the night.
Making everything very quiet in my room.
I believe I heard myself cry for a long, long time.

1938
查尔斯·西米克

那年，纳粹进驻维也纳，
超人在《动作漫画》上初次亮相，
斯大林在对革命战友进行大清洗，
首家冰雪皇后在伊利诺伊州的坎卡基开业，
而我躺在自己的婴儿床上，尿尿拉在尿布里。
平·克劳斯贝唱道：“你小时候肯定是个漂亮宝贝。”
后来被各家报纸叫做“歧途柯里根”的
一名飞行员从纽约起飞前往加州，
却降落在了爱尔兰，而我当时看着妈妈
从蓝色长袍里掏出一只乳房向我走来。
那年九月，一场飓风把西安普敦的
一家电影院卷起，刮进海里。
人们担心世界末日就要到来。
有一种鱼据说早已灭绝了七千万年，
却又在南非的近海上被渔网捞起。
我躺在婴儿床上，白天越来越短，天越来越冷，
第一场大雪在夜晚落下，
使得我房间里一切悄然无声。
我想，当时我听到自己哭了很久，很久。
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FROM 210.36.46.*