A Transient Visitor in Life　生命中的过客

◎ Joanne Pete

When he told me he was leaving I felt like a vase which has just smashed. There were pieces of me all over the tidy, tan tiles. He kept talking, telling me why he was leaving, explaining it was for the best, and I could do better, it was his fault and not mine. I had heard it before many times and yet somehow was still not immune; perhaps one did not become immune to such felony.

当他告诉我他要离开时，我感觉自己像是一个摔碎的花瓶。那洁净的棕黄色的地毯上布满了我的碎片。他一直在讲话，告诉我他为什么要走，并解释说这是最好的选择，我可以做得更好，这一切是他的错误，与我无关。这些我以前听过很多遍了，但我的情绪还是无法稳定；也许一个人不可能面对如此巨大的打击还能产生免疫力。

He left and I tried to get on with my life. I filled the kettle and put it on to boil, I took out my old red mug and filled it with coffee watching as each coffee granule slipped in to the bone china. That was what my life had been like, endless omissions of coffee granules, somehow never managing to make that cup of coffee.

他走了，我试图让自己的生活恢复正常。我把水壶灌满，然后去烧水，我把自己红色的旧水杯拿了出来，将咖啡倒进去，眼睛盯着每一颗咖啡粒滑落进骨灰瓷的杯子中。那就是我曾经的生活，如同咖啡粒无休止地疏漏，永远冲不成那杯咖啡。

Somehow when the kettle piped its finishing warning I pretended not to hear it. That’s what Mike’s leaving had been like, sudden and with an awful finality. I would rather just wallow in uncertainty than have things finished. I laughed at myself. Imagine getting all philosophical and sentimental about a mug of coffee. I must be getting old.

水烧开了，壶尖声鸣响时，我假装没有听见。那声音就像迈克的离去，突然且带有一种可怕的命中注定。我宁愿摇摆在不确定性之中，也不愿一切事情都有定论。我嘲笑自己。想象跟一大杯咖啡有关的哲学及伤感的思想。我一定是老了。

And yet it was a young woman who stared back at me from the mirror. A young woman full of promise and hope, a young woman with bright eyes and full lips just waiting to take on the world. I never loved Mike anyway. Besides there are more important things. More important than love, I insist to myself firmly. The lid goes back on the coffee just like closure on the whole Mike experience.

但镜子那边却有一个年轻的女人回头看我。一个大有前途和希望的女人，一个等待将自己明亮的双眼和丰满的唇部展现给世界的女人。无论如何我从来没有爱过迈克，而且还有更重要的事情。我坚定地对自己说，还有比爱更重要的东西。眼睛回过去看看了咖啡，就像是要封锁与迈克有关的所有经历。

He doesn’t haunt my dreams as I feared that night. Instead I am flying far across fields and woods, looking down on those below me. Suddenly I fall to the ground and it is only when I wake up that I realize I was shot by a hunter, brought down by the burden of not the bullet but the soul of the man who shot it. I realize later, with some degree of understanding, that Mike was the hunter holding me down and I am the bird that longs to fly. The next night my dream is similar to the previous nights, but without the hunter. I fly free until I meet another bird who flies with me in perfect harmony. I realize with some relief that there is a bird out there for me, there is another person, not necessarily a lover perhaps just a friend, but there is someone out there who is my soul mate. I think about being a broken vase again and realize that I have glued myself back together, what Mike has is merely a little part of my time in earth, a little understanding of my physical being. He has only, a little piece of me.

那晚他并没有如我所担心地出现在我梦里。相反，我飞过了很远的田野和树林，看着下面的一切。突然我掉在了地上，直到醒来我才意识到我被一个猎人射中了，并不是被子弹的重量拉了下来，而是由于猎人灵魂的重量。此后带着几分感悟，我明白了迈克就是那个把我拉下来的猎人，而我是那只渴望飞翔的鸟儿。第二天晚上我的梦和前几夜十分相似，但不同的是没有了猎人。我自由地飞翔，直到我遇到了另外一只能与我携手共进的鸟儿。带着几分欣慰，我明白远处有一只我的小鸟，有另外一个人，不一定非得是情人，或许是朋友，但一定有一个人是我灵魂的伴侣。我又把自己想成破碎的花瓶，然后意识到我已经把自己粘合到了一起，迈克仅仅是我生命的很小一部分，他仅仅了解我的表面，他仅仅只是我生命中的小小一部分。

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