梦幻一样，奇遇在凯旋门

我认出了你，因为看到了

你留在路上的足迹，

我那被践踏的心房疼痛异常。                      

                      ——西门内斯

—                 

在难以诉说的

激情和苦痛之中，

朝鲜战争结束半个多世纪了。

那些高举红旗与炸药的人，

那些期待闪电和雷雨的人，

那些从尸山血海中爬出的战士，

那些喝令风云变幻的将军，

他们都到哪里去了？

他们又留下了什么？

（谁挑起这场远东的战争？

长期以来众说纷纭。

如今，解密的材料披露：

金日成受命于斯大林。）

资深记者曹慕云，

和我这自诩“看海的诗人”，

曾经是莫逆之交，

共同经历过朝鲜战争。

难忘风雪、饥饿、血腥的岁月，

难忘革命友谊、死亡与爱情，

现在，老记者向我，

详述他巧遇

“死亡战友”的欧洲之行。

…… ……

夏夜。蓝色的流萤，

飘忽，游荡。

闪电照亮的霎那，

我无力地倒下，

在无数裂缝的岩石间，

在纤柔的青草上。

阿尔卑斯山啊， 峡谷里

那伟岸的山毛榉和不知名

而又芳香的矮树丛，

屈身搂抱着我。

躺在异国的荒原，惊恐，

旅途劳顿连同迷茫，

载着一片片落叶，

漂流在忧郁的水面。

灵魂飞离我的躯壳，

俯视巍峨的彭宁山脉。

大格洛克纳姊妹

雕塑雪峰冰冠。

溪流边，渴望的篝火熊熊燃烧。

星星暂时顶替了太阳，

缀满雪线映照的夜空。

人类的良知发出古老试题：

“谁能了解时光背后的东西”

无意祈求命运的饶恕，

我心头苦痛的垒块，

被阿尔卑斯山，

那风信子般的温柔，

絮絮飘飞的雪花，

融落，又凝结。

灵魂在冷暖之外飞翔，

飞离冰冻的躯壳。

曾经苍茫的古老大陆

——欧罗巴

一场辉煌的风暴，

正卷起新的雪崩。

群山衔接的边陲，

早已消失界碑；

欧盟，现代与古典，

挽起手臂在凝视我

来自血与火熔铸，

东方诗歌的沉雷。

黄昏的云朵驮载，

晚祷的钟声。

灯火点燃了星辰。

我无意跟随先贤的足迹，

梦回音乐之都，

表达朝圣者的虔诚。

奥地利宫殿巍峨。

钟情或不慎，

迷失在山坡上的古城。

此刻，萨尔斯堡，

音符闪耀在夜空；

一群典雅的大理石雕像，

围绕喷泉絮语，

水花烟雾中，

隐约走来莫札特熟悉的身影。

二

沿着多瑙河蓝色的指引，

我游荡在阿尔卑斯山。

那一晚在德奥边境憩息，

看天鹅湖的秀美宁静，

突然间脑海中热流翻滚。

半个多世纪之后的今天，

和平绚丽的焰火，

在维也纳和巴黎上空，

画出朵朵鲜花的弧线。

该死的，早已死去。

未死的，期待超生。

有谁还会想起那弥漫在朝鲜，

莽苍群山沟壑中，

炸弹横飞的死亡黑烟？

昨天，被扔进历史的角落，

历史，在迷茫的今天复活。

不可思议的灵符密语，

驱使我闯入魔幻梦乡。

在巴黎香舍榭丽大街，

背靠凯旋门金色的斜阳，

一个绅士摸样的亚裔男子，

几乎蛮横地，

将我撞个踉跄。

“嗨，曹记者，老伙计，

跟着你，瞅着你

实在不敢相信：

真是你，真是你，

真地是你！”

仿佛时光倒转。

芝麻开门。

我揉搓昏花双眼，

凝望面前老人。

噩梦复活。

惶恐。喜悦。紧张。

…… ……

“啊，祁昌，老伙计，

你呀，是你，是你！

我也认出了你。

多少年了，

我在到处寻找你。

有人说你牺牲了，

可战斗结束打扫战场时，

翻遍阵亡烈士的遗体，

也没有发现你。

…… ……”

“我写过你的战地报导，

我军英模榜上有你的名字。

你，你，你还活着…

你这个被死神掳走的人”

“……不， 不，

那不是我！那不是我！

别让我给‘英雄’涂抹污名

我、我是一个——

被美军释放的战俘；

一个额头上，

曾被纹写黑色钤记的人。”

…… ……

巴黎香榭丽舍大街。

午后，街角露天咖啡馆，

阳光映照满脸沧桑的男人。

两个跨越死亡洼地的好友，

坐在僻静咖啡桌前交谈，

微风吹拂祁昌的灰白头发，

曹牧云的鬓角霜雪浸染。

“难忘惊魂的夏季战役，

作为军报一名记者，

我至今还记得那次撤退。

你们尖刀营完成了炸桥任务，

又被疯狂反扑的敌人包围……” 

…… ……

五月。朝鲜泛滥的雷雨，

凝固汽油弹漫山遍野燃烧。

岩石、树木、村落，

处处响彻死亡之神的哭号。

大规模地追击，

复又大规模地撤退。

我军前卫尖刀营的战士，

穿插途中奉命炸毁江桥。

山野混战的士兵。

森林覆巢的黄蜂。

坦克轰鸣。

汽车狂奔。

为掩护大部队后撤，

他们守卫抱川一线的山间通道。

那一天突袭竹灵山主峰。

敌机疯狂轰炸，

群山间，地黯天昏。

右边，树林燃烧，

崖石坍塌，钢铁溶化，

山沟仿佛锅炉在沸腾；

瞬间，时光静止，

生命成为失望的碎片；

左面，山塌地陷，

奔腾呼啸的临津江水，

夹裹漂木、石块和尸体，

凝固汽油弹在岸边燃烧，

死亡正与烟雾赛跑。

他从美军尸体中爬出，

满身血污，军服烧焦，

却还像魔鬼般狞笑。

冻凝的伤口烧灼灵魂，

恨不能站起来仰天长啸。

临津江奄奄一息。

远处部队突围的山峰，

已经被失败与死亡笼罩。

他一次次爬起，

又一次次摔倒。

饥饿与疼痛早已麻木，

渴望暴风雨再次袭来，

群山响彻大反攻的号角。

他在死神黝黑的羽翼下，

等待厚厚的泥土掩埋。

浑浊的天空，

覆盖所有的梦；

火球与浓烟在江边志哀。

树丛里炮火未曾炸死的狐狸，

一溜火红奔向喘息的森林。

劫后余生的晚霞，

高高地承载着，

一个求生者孤独的脚印。

2010-10-8，改写

Chapter 8

Moments when unscrambling the footprints rich left

On the rough road, hence let me recognize you; that

has trampled on the unusual pain burst of my heart.

                               —— Ximenes

   Like a dream, an adventure

Under the triumphal arch

Long shared the emotions and sufferings

That in difficulties to show up all the details

Of the Korea War, more than half a century has passed

Trace those men, who held high their red flags and

Carried explosive cartridges; those men who looked

Forward to lightning and thunders, and those soldiers

Crawled back from piles of dead and those

Lions that plotted and enjoyed the war. Where

They have gone to what they have left to the world?

(Who had plotted the Korea War? The answers

Are still on people's lips. Today, through Russia's

Deciphering documentary evidence:

Kim Il Sung had cooperated with their master Stalin）

The experienced report Cao Mu-yun and

I, as a self-styled “sea-watching poet “,

Were the sworn friends in the Korea War.

Barely forget those blood-smelling days

When in windy-snow and in the suffering of hunger,

And, the love and death

Soaked up friendship of revolutionary.

Now the aged report was telling me how

Met—merely coincidental—his

Should-be-dead fellow in his Europe trip.

……

A summer night,

In the air blue fireflies waved,

To and fro, dimly floating;

A moment when lightning flashed

Over Alpine cracked rocks, deadly tiring,

I fell down in its glen, soft and

New the green was. Stretching

The shadows beneath tall beeches

And sweet-smelling undergrowth

Bent embraced my body.

Lay on the wild field, on the foreign land, 

Frightened, wearied with vast and haze,

As autumn leaves downward

On dark waters, Melancholy,

The soul left shell Flew up high and

Overlooked the top of Pennies.

There is the Grossglockner sister-peak

Erect as the eternal sculpture of their ice-crowns.

Along the stream-flowing, the longing bonfires roared,

And like a sun the stars shine on the night sky with

The snowlines decorated. There is an age-old

Question from the human-conscience:

“Who could understand the meaning beyond the Time?”

Barely prayed for forgiveness

Of my fortune, just letting the meek

Of Alpine, like hyacinths, act

Through the flying snowflakes, melt

The hardened griefs in my heart

And then congealed it.

Beyond the coldness and warmth

Fly high the souls from its icy-cold shells.

The old continent, it was boundless—

Europe, where a huge practice

Now as a splendid storm carries

Along with a fresh avalanche.

I see the boundary monuments had disappeared

On the border among their mountain and valleys

EU, with its every crouching hollow in unbroken, as

The modern and still classical casts its glimpse

On the thunders of blood-and-fire melted

In my east poems.

Leap over dusk clouds the sounds

Of complin-bells, the stars

In sky light up as by our lamps.

I do not attempt to go after our predecessors

Back to the City of Music in a dream

To show the reverence of a pilgrim.

Towering on a slope Austria Palace

In eternal morning or careless of the tempests

Lives a life bewildered of an ancient city.

Just now in Salzburg, the sounds of music Light

Up the evening sky; A group of marble statues

Elegant around a murmuring fountain; against

The watering fogs and white blossoms

Spout of the fountain the familiar figure of Mozart

Dimly comes forth.

Along the unexpected blue of the Danube River

I had roved about the majestic Alps.

That night when rest on of Germany and Austria border,

Gazing of picturesque Swan Lake the still scenes,

My heart was full of thoughts, as the fit took me.

Days now after a half-century had gone,

On the skies of Vienna and Paris,

The spouted peaceful fireworks party-colored,

Arced gracefully in flower -styles

Ones must die died many years ago;

Ones in living very wish to revive. Yet who

Should and would remember again those black smokes

Clinging subtly at crags and chasms, its death-smells,

Echoing the flying bombshells in Korea War?

Yesterday has been thrown to a corner of history

And yet the history revives within bewildered today.  

Mysterious Talisman and Cryptolalia had driven

Me into a mysterious dream;

  While I had loitered along Avenue des Champs –Elysées

Against a golden sunset

Of Paris Arc de Triophe,

An Asian-like gentleman in running almost

Collided with me in stumble:

“Hi, reporter Cao, my old partner,

Following you staring at you,

I couldn’t believe my eyes

To the paces of you!

Is it really you! ”

As if time turned backward now, with

A muffled call of ‘Open Sesame”;

I rubbed my eyes in wonder, gazing the man’s face

Being lost so long in a dream,

Felt some trepidation

And tense close to joy.

…… ……

“Hi, Qi Chang! It’s you,

My old partner,

I recognize you!

I couldn't believe my eye!

How many years

I’ve been looking for you!

Some said you died in piles

Of our martyrs, in fighting fields

But we never found any trace of your dead body.

…… ……”

“I have written down about you a report,

And as one of our heroes of Army-fighting Models

You, you, now still alive but

The one as if Death had taken away from us.”

…… ……

“……Ou, no,

It wasn’t me! It wasn’t me at all!

Don’t let me stain a hero’s name.

A black seal marked

On the forehead of a man

Was released by the US

Army in the war；captivity to captivity… 

… …

Paris.

That afternoon, In Avenue des champs – Elysées,

In an open coffee shop at a street corner.

Sunshine shone on two men face-wearied,

Who sat by a coffee-table, quietly talking about

Those days with their fellowship over death-hollows.

The breeze blew the pale hair of Qi-Chang and

Of Cao Mu-yun grayish-white the sideburns.

“Never forget that summer battle that shocked

The world when withdrew as a field-report I was that

   Time. After your spear-head battalion had done it,

The bridge then went in the air, but soon the mad

Enemy counterattacked to surround our troop …” 

… …

May. The rainy within thunders of days and nights

In Korea while burning the incendiary bomb's fires

Over rocks, woods, villages:-of the cries of death

Rose up everywhere .chased the enemy on

A large scale as well as withdrawing soon on it.

Our soldiers of the spear-head battalion on

The way piercing through with new order to burst

A bridge; then being cut off from each other

Through the howitzer fire

And shells of artillery fought

And run, like wasps in woods lost nest,

Of both sides of the soldiers. Tanks rumbled

And vehicles with the dust spuming from their tracks.

In order to cover the withdrawal of the main force.

They deployed

To the Bao-Chuan region, defended its hill pass.

That day,

A surprise raid on the Chinese.

The right side

Of the main peak of the Zhuling mountain range.

Trees in the fire,

The napalms and bombs dropped like claps of thunders,

The earth shook, skies darkened,

Gunfire and mortars swept the valleys,

Rocks broken, as if in an evil boiler metals melted.

Time seemed to come to stand

Still in the valleys,

Of it Life became the failed fragments.

Its left side the hills collapsed with

The land sunken.

 Along the deep channel between sandbanks ran

With rolling stones, timbers, bamboo poles,

And carcasses, the muddy Imjin boomed

Curving through the barren valleys and along levees.

The incendiary bomb's fire burning and

Deaths run among the burning smoke.

Crawling out from a pile of the US corpses,

Uniform burned-out, the black wounds congealed like

The burning soul made his face smile like

A monster and want to stand up crying into the air.

The girder of the Imjin River Bridge lay, twisted.

Enveloped the peaks far of the mountains death and

The grey mist, where the troops did on a retreat.

    He got up and fell, tumbled, and again falling

With the numb feelings

0f hunger and pain, He was thirsting

For the next main counteroffensive of letting

The bugles and whistles sound among

The mountains, even for a while. Collapsed

On the ground under the death of black thick wings,

He was waiting to be buried.

The fog and mist sky blanketed all dreams,

The side Of Riverbanks reeked of gasoline,

And Gun smokes with the whistling of a nameless

Sigh of the wind and burning flesh.

A red fox survived in the bushes

Run out in hurry as a flash to the shady woods.

A rosy sunset of survival was eyeing the footprints

Of a lone survivor kept on the earth beneath.