Hour in the Sun　陽光下的時光

Hour in the Sun　陽光下的時光

◎ John H. Bradley

“I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days.” —Henry David Thoreau

“我雖然不富甲天下，卻擁有無數(shù)和煦陽光和晴朗夏日。” ——亨利·戴維·梭羅

When Thoreau wrote that line, he was thinking of the Walden Pond he knew as a boy.

寫這句話時，梭羅想起孩提時代的瓦爾登湖。

Woodchoppers and the iron horse had not yet greatly damaged the beauty of its setting. A boy could go to the pond and lie on his back against the seat of a boat, lazily drifting from shore to shore while the loons dived and the swallows dipped around him. Thoreau loved to recall such sunny hours and summer days, “when idleness was the most attractive and productive business.”

當時伐木者和火車尚未嚴重損壞湖畔的優(yōu)美景致，小男孩可以走進湖中，仰臥在一葉扁舟上，自一岸緩慢而慵懶地漂向另一岸，美妙的歌聲歡呼相伴，鳥兒在四周戲水翻飛。梭羅喜歡回憶這些和煦陽光和晴朗夏日，“慵懶是最迷人也是最富有動力的事情！”

I too was a boy in love with a pond, rich in sunny hours and summer days. Sun and summer are still what they always were, but the boy and the pond changed. The boy, who is now a man, no longer find much time for idle drifting. The pond has been annexed by a great city.

我也曾是熱愛湖塘的小男孩，擁有無數(shù)和煦陽光與晴朗夏日。如今，陽光和夏日依舊如故，男孩和湖塘卻早已改變。那個男孩，現(xiàn)在已長大成人，不再有那么多的時間泛舟湖上，隨意漂流。湖塘也被一個美麗的大城市兼并。

The swamps where herons once hunted are now drained and filled with houses. The bay where water lilies quietly floated is now a harbor for motor boats. In short, everything that the boy loved no longer exists—except in the man’s memory of it.

曾有蒼鷺覓食的泥濘之地，如今已枯竭殆盡，上面蓋滿了房舍。睡蓮靜靜漂浮的湖灣，現(xiàn)在成了汽艇的避風港。簡而言之，男孩所愛的一切已不復存在——只留在了他的記憶中。

Some people insist that only today and tomorrow matter. But how much poorer we would be if we really lived by that rule! So much of what we do today is frivolous and futile and soon forgotten. So much of what we hope to do tomorrow never happens.

有人堅持認為，只有今日和明日才是重要的。但如果真的依據(jù)這條規(guī)則來生活，我們將何其可憐！那么多我們今日所做的事，都是徒勞輕薄的事，也容易被忘記。那么多我們期待明天做的事，卻從來沒有發(fā)生過。

The past is the bank in which we store our most valuable possession: the memories that give meaning and depth to our lives.

過去是一所銀行，我們將最寶貴的財富——記憶珍藏其中。記憶賜予我們生命的意義和深度。

Those who truly treasure the past will not bemoan the passing of the good old days, because days enshrined in memory are never lost.

那些真正珍惜過去的人，不會悲嘆過去的美好時光。因為藏于記憶中的時光從來不曾流逝。

Death itself is powerless to still a remembered voice or erase a remembered smile. And for one boy who is now a man, there is a pond which neither time nor tide can change, where he can still spend a quite hour in the sun.

死亡本身也無力止住記憶中的一個聲音，或抹去記憶中的一次微笑。對現(xiàn)已長大成人的那個男孩來說，那兒將有一個湖塘，不會因時間和潮流而改變，在那兒，他可以繼續(xù)在陽光下享受靜謐的時光。

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