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收音機的無線電波
傳來阿布馬沙‧艾爾札卡威之死的新聞
以意想不到的力量衝擊著我，在一不尋常之處──佛寺
這裏嚴禁任何型態的暴力
無限的本地風光在此
映照出浩瀚的內在宇宙
僧尼著素袍來來往往並出坡作務
神氣十足的孔雀，有公有母，兀自昂首闊步
六至十八歲的學生在校學習
著重於人格陶冶
並問道：如何服務世界
雄偉的橡木和美國大梧桐樹似守護者般展開手臂，高聳其上
這則新聞播出時，我才繫上車子安全帶
頓時我感覺更不安全
兩枚五百磅的炸彈──這是收音機的播報聲音
所含爆炸物足以吞噬整棟房屋
並在棗椰果園留下一個房屋般大的彈坑
突兀、毀滅、疏離，我想：恰似流星
艾爾札卡威，這恐怖威脅的空洞之音
支離破碎血淋淋，他真正的肉體已成戰利品
誰不願見伊拉克恐怖活動的末路
誰不願見汽車、嬰兒車爆炸的終止
誰不願見太平間裡無須尋覓失蹤親人？
跨出車子
我佇立那兒幾
乎以為那些大樹要暈眩倒下
大地在瞬間化作流水
幾天前蕾巧兒告訴我一個故事
當時聽來似乎單純：
「我踢足球時蟲子飛入眼睛
足足一分鐘
我半瞎似的蹣跚橫過球場，拼命眨眼
為了引出蟲子
我讓粗大笨拙的手指一旁閒置
這真是太可笑！
球友對我說：把它弄死！
但我笑笑又眨眼
蟲子終於突圍而出！」
倚著美國大梧桐樹佇立
我難以調和這兩種影像
一邊是獵鷹戰鬥機和它凶狠的飛彈在瞄準獵靶
另一邊是傻呼呼的十四歲孩子笨手笨腳地
為生命找尋出路
站在那兒，在佛教的中小學外
我不得不想哪個影像會開花成長
哪個影像可以播種未來？
是駕著F-16戰機奉命殺戮的成年男子
抑或聽從自己心靈聲音的小女子？
編按：大衛‧史密斯斐利是瑜伽市居民，亦是哈利出版社今秋將發行的「伊拉克詩 無國界戰場」的作者。
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Carried on radio waves,
news of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s death reached me
with unexpected force and in an unlikely place:
a Buddhist monastery.
It is a place where violence, in any form, is forbidden entrance,
and where vast internal spaces are mirrored
by the boundless natural landscape.
Nuns and monks, in simple robes, walk and work.
Radiant peacocks and peahens strut.
Students, aged six to eighteen, study in a school that emphasizes character
and asks How can you be of service to the world?
Above it all, like guardians, massive oaks and sycamores spread their arms.
The news arrived as I fastened my safety belt
and suddenly I felt anything but safer.
“Two five hundred pound bombs,” a radio voice said,
enough explosive bite in their jaws to swallow a house
and leave a house-sized crater in a date palm orchard.
Like a meteor, I thought. Sudden, suicidal, alien.
Al-Zarqawi, the disembodied voice of terrorist threats,
his actual body, broken and bloody, now a war trophy.
Who doesn’t want to see an end to terror in Iraq,
an end to exploding cars and baby carriages,
to looking for missing relatives in morgues?
I stepped out of my car.
Standing there,
I more than half expected those great trees to swoon,
the ground to turn momentarily fluid.
Days before, Rachael had told a story.
It seemed simple then.
“A bug flew into my eye while I played soccer.
For a full minute,
I stumbled across the field, half-blind, frantically blinking,
trying to free the bug,
holding my big, clumsy fingers at my side.
It was hilarious.
Teammates told me ‘Just kill it,’
but I laughed
and blinked and the bug broke free.“
Standing there alongside the sycamores,
I could not reconcile the two images:
on the one hand, the Fighter Falcon and its ferocious bombs finding their target
and on the other the foolish fourteen-year old, fumbling,
finding another way.
Standing there outside the Buddhist elementary and secondary schools,
I couldn’t help wonder which image would flower,
which image would seed our future:
the grown men in the F-16 following orders to kill
or the girl-woman, following a voice only she can hear.
Editor’s note: David Smith-Ferri, a Ukiah resident, is author of
Battlefield Without Borders, Iraq Poems, due out this fall from Haley’s Publishing.
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