ずっと気になっている詩が一編あります
それは とても崇高で
そして 美しく
しかし 畏れも感じる詩です
そんな訳で 敢えて和訳しようとはせず
いつも原文のまま詠むことにしています
A Prayer in the Pentagon by Robert Dederick
我々の地球を我々は自らの手で破壊し
いつの日か ‘Nought = Zero’ がやって来るのではないか？
そんな「人類への警鐘」
難解ではありますが 興味があれば読んでみて
Nine
planets, Sir, endlessly circle, Sir, one yellow star among Sir’s galaxies: Pluto Neptune Venus Jupiter Saturn Uranus Mercury Mars and this-this watered and this aired this favored this one
where all that crawl and swim and fly and run
that drove and swarm and herd and flock are in
with tooth and leg and lung and claw and fin
and created clothed and colored are by Sir
Eight
colors (counting white) Sir’s rainbow makes
when whiteness on Sir’s broken waters breaks
arched over tidal blue and branching gray
and grazing green foaling brown down and away
and gorsing yellow glow and honeyed hay
and petalled blush and mottled winging whir;
and limpid eyes each of Sir’s colors wakes dark-irised are and cleared and curved by Sir
Seven
tossing seas Sir’s pent-up lands divide where silver shoals in aching green-ness glide
turn suddenly and dart and flatly lie break surface plunge and from each other hide
and stare as though by staring they aver what sweet surprise had widened each wide eye
that once looked early on creating Sir
Six
senses there were then in us who were salt-tasting all along the salt-scented shore
who felt crust cool and looked on shrinking sea
and heard gull-cry on draining estuary and found back of these five a something more
a sense of self and back of self–Sir
Five
fingers though (counting a thumb) were what
we mostly were aware of as we fought
Sir’s elements and cleared Sir’s forests and sought
creation-wise new metalled ways to go by spinning wheel and wing off runway. So?
Four
quarters of our world began to grow too few and of Sir’s yellow star we thought
equations scribbled bubbled in retort distilled its hot explosive secrets. So?
Three
questions pose themselves now as we wait:
did Sir not know how to end what Sir began?
or could we choose? or did Sir always plan?
Two
hands of ours to bring us soon or late bent to destroy what the hands of Sir had wrought
One
day when we and all our world are brought to
Nought?
救うのは超人的な力なのか？
それとも私たちの「手」によるものなのか？
Sir = 神 との対話 という形の詩です
僕はこの詩を逆から詠むという工夫をしてみた
すると一つの絵が浮かんできたのです
Dave Matthews は、この詩からインスピレーションを得て、この曲を作りました
‘Typical Situation’
Too many choices
Everybody’s happy
Everybody’s free
We’ll keep the big door open
Everyone’ll come around
Why are you different?
選択肢は幾つもある
誰もがハッピーで
誰もが自由
僕らは大きな扉を開けたままにしておこう
みんながやって来る
どうして君だけが違うと言うんだい？
僕もまた、自身の扉の一つを大きく開放したところ