吃水果的诗 与 老年的回忆
偶然看到默温的这首黑樱桃，加上希尼的黑莓与阿特伍德的黑莓，三首诗都是关于摘果子吃，都是关于衰老、记忆、时间流逝。默温是老年看着第一次试飞的金翅雀、初夏的阳光、新摘下的樱桃，告诉自己记住这些。希尼是回望童年摘黑莓，每年都摘好多试图保存盛夏的甜美，然而每年都痛惜地看着黑莓无可挽回地烂掉，越是大把大把的甜美越是难留，越是难留越是想要挽留，童年的失望和执着在此后人生不断重复。而阿特伍德则是从一个人的生命看向母亲的生命、祖母的生命、孩子的生命、松鼠和鸟儿的生命，莓果和生命的滋养，一代代人（与其他动物）分享、流淌，一个生命的流逝也得到了一点释然。
最后加上李立扬的桃子，生命苦短、终有一死，可是生命中有那些美好的瞬间，一整个夏天的阳光和喜悦全在一口桃子中了，那一刻，仿佛死亡不存在，仿佛生命就是从喜悦到喜悦，从花开到花开，花落暂时可以忘记。
Black Cherries W.S. Merwin Late in May as the light lengthens toward summer the young goldfinches flutter down through the day for the first time to find themselves among fallen petals cradling their day’s colors in the day’s shadows of the garden beside the old house after a cold spring with no rain not a sound comes from the empty village as I stand eating the black cherries from the loaded branches above me saying to myself Remember this Blackberry-Picking - Seamus Heaney for Philip Hobsbaum
Late August, given heavy rain and sun For a full week, the blackberries would ripen. At first, just one, a glossy purple clot Among others, red, green, hard as a knot. You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam-pots Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots. Round hayfields, cornfields and potato-drills We trekked and picked until the cans were full, Until the tinkling bottom had been covered With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard's. We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre. But when the bath was filled we found a fur, A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache. The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour.
I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot. Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not. Blackberries Margaret Atwood
In the early morning an old woman is picking blackberries in the shade. It will be too hot later but right now there’s dew. Some berries fall: those are for squirrels. Some are unripe, reserved for bears. Some go into the metal bowl. Those are for you, so you may taste them just for a moment. That’s good times: one little sweetness after another, then quickly gone. Once, this old woman I’m conjuring up for you would have been my grandmother. Today it’s me. Years from now it might be you, if you’re quite lucky. The hands reaching in among the leaves and spines were once my mother’s. I’ve passed them on. Decades ahead, you’ll study your own temporary hands, and you’ll remember. Don’t cry, this is what happens. Look! The steel bowl is almost full. Enough for all of us. The blackberries gleam like glass, like the glass ornaments we hang on trees in December to remind ourselves to be grateful for snow. Some berries occur in sun, but they are smaller. It’s as I always told you: the best ones grow in shadow. From Blossoms BY Li-Young Lee From blossoms comes this brown paper bag of peaches we bought from the boy at the bend in the road where we turned toward signs painted Peaches. From laden boughs, from hands, from sweet fellowship in the bins, comes nectar at the roadside, succulent peaches we devour, dusty skin and all, comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat. O, to take what we love inside, to carry within us an orchard, to eat not only the skin, but the shade, not only the sugar, but the days, to hold the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into the round jubilance of peach. There are days we live as if death were nowhere in the background; from joy to joy to joy, from wing to wing, from blossom to blossom to impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.
