作者：查尔斯.布考斯基
翻译：莫笑愚


我醒来口干舌燥，蕨类植物死了，
这些盆栽植物黄如玉米；
我的女人也已离开
而这些空酒瓶仿佛血尽而亡的尸体
用空虚环绕我；
但阳光依然耀眼，
我的女房东的字据笔迹端正
以温和而枯黄的口吻；什么风格，一个小丑
拿这尖酸的疼痛开玩笑；酸痛
由于它存在，仅此而已；
我用旧刀片小心地剃须
这个男人曾经年轻，并且
据说是个天才；但是
那不过是叶子的悲剧，
这死亡的蕨类，这死亡的植物；
我走进玩牌大厅
女房东就站在那里
用最后的诅咒，
让我下地狱，
她舞动肥大而热汗涔涔的臂膀
大叫着索要房租
因为这个世界同时辜负了
我们俩。

（莫笑愚译于2015-05-08，于加州棕榈泉）



附英文原文：

THE TRAGEDY OF THE LEAVES
BY CHARLES BUKOWSKI


I awakened to dryness and the ferns were dead,
the potted plants yellow as corn;
my woman was gone
and the empty bottles like bled corpses
surrounded me with their uselessness;
the sun was still good, though,
and my landlady's note cracked in fine and 
undemanding yellowness; what style, a jester
with jokes upon absurd pain; pain is absurd
because it exists, nothing more;
I shaved carefully with an old razor
the man who had once been young and
said to have genius; but
that's the tragedy of the leaves,
the dead ferns, the dead plants;
and I walked into a card hall
where the landlady stood
execrating and final,
sending me to hell,
waving her fat, sweaty arms
and screaming for rent
because the world had failed us
both.