I watched them look for an empty table at one of the adjoining caffès.
My friends asked me if he was hitting on her.
I don’t know, I replied.
Are they doing it, then?
Didn’t know that either.
I’d love to be in his shoes.
Who wouldn’t?
我看著他們在隔壁一家咖啡店里找空位。
幾個朋友問我奧利弗是不是在追她。
我不知道,我回答。
那他們做了嗎?
我也不知道。
我很樂意變成他。
誰不想?
But I was in heaven. That he hadn’t forgotten our conversation about Celan gave me a shot of tonic I hadn’t experienced in many, many days. It spilled over everything I touched. Just a word, a gaze, and I was in heaven. To be happy like this maybe wasn’t so difficult after all. All I had to do was find the source of happiness in me and not rely on others to supply it the next time.
但我仿佛置身天堂。他沒忘記我們有關(guān)策蘭的對話,給了我這么、這么多天以來不曾打過的一針強心劑。這種振奮感滿溢出來,溢到了我接觸的一切東西上。只需一句話、一個眼神,我就仿佛置身天堂。幸?;蛟S一點都不難。下次我只需要從自己內(nèi)心尋找幸福的源泉,不必再依賴他人給予。
I remembered the scene in the Bible when Jacob22 asks Rachel23 for water and on hearing her speak the words that were prophesied for him, throws up his hands to heaven and kisses the ground by the well. Me Jewish, Celan Jewish, Oliver Jewish—we were in a half ghetto, half oasis, in an otherwise cruel and unflinching world where fuddling around strangers suddenly stops, where we misread no one and no one misjudges us, where one person simply knows the other and knows him so thoroughly that to be taken away from such intimacy is galut, the Hebrew word for exile and dispersal. Was he my home, then, my homecoming? You are my homecoming. When I’m with you and we’re well together, there is nothing more I want. You make me like who I am, who I become when you’re with me, Oliver. If there is any truth in the world, it lies when I’m with you, and if I find the courage to speak my truth to you one day, remind me to light a candle in thanksgiving at every altar in Rome.
我記得《圣經(jīng)》里的那個場景。雅各向拉結(jié)要水;聽到拉結(jié)給他的預(yù)言之后,雅各雙手高舉向天,親吻泉水旁的土地。我是猶太人、策蘭是猶太人、奧利弗是猶太人——我們置身半猶太居住區(qū)、半綠洲,置身一個除此之外總是殘酷、絕不妥協(xié)的世界。在這兒,醉鬼也會清明度日;在這兒我們不誤解任何人,也沒有任何人錯估我們。在這兒,一個人就是能了解另一個人,而且了解得那么徹底,以致如果剝奪了這種親密,就是?galut,也就是希伯來語所謂的“背井離鄉(xiāng)”或“離散”。他是我的故里,我的歸處嗎?你是我最后的歸宿。當(dāng)我與你和睦共處,我別無所求。奧利弗,你讓我喜歡自己,跟你在一起時的那個自己。如果這世界有任何真實可言,真實就存在于我和你在一起的時候。如果有一天我鼓起勇氣把我的真心告訴你,請?zhí)嵝盐?,感恩?jié)那天,要在羅馬的每個圣壇點亮一根蠟燭。