My father said I could not do it,
but all night I picked the peaches.
The orchard was still, the canals ran steadily.

I was a girl then, my chest its own walled garden.

How many ladders to gather an orchard?

I had only one and a long patience with lit hands
and the looking of the stars which moved right through me
the way the water moved through the canals with a voice
that seemed to speak of this moonless gathering
and those who had gathered before me.

I put the peaches in the pond’s cold water,
all night up the ladder and down, all night my hands
twisting fruit as if I were entering a thousand doors,
all night my back a straight road to the sky.

And then out of its own goodness, out
of the far fields of the stars, the morning came,
and inside me was the stillness a bell possesses
just after it has been rung, before the metal
begins to long again for the clapper’s stroke.
The light came over the orchard.

The canals were silver and then were not.
and the pond was–I could see as I laid
the last peach in the water–full of fish and eyes.

父亲说我做不了那些，
但整夜我采摘桃子。

果园沉静，沟渠坚定地流淌。

那时我还是女孩，我的心
是一座自我围筑的庭院。

多少把梯子才能采摘一座果园？

我只有一把梯子，和被照亮的
耐久的双手。群星的注视
越过我的身躯，一如那流水越过沟渠
仿佛诉说着 我们这无月的采集
还诉说着 那前人的采集。

我把桃子放入池塘的冷水中。
整夜我攀爬梯子，整夜我的双手
拧下果实，仿佛推开一千扇门，
整夜我的背影是一条踏往星空的道路。

由于这自身的善良，黎明
自远方的星野赶来。而在我的躯体里
有一种钟的寂静，仿佛刚刚响起的钟声
再次渴望那铃舌的敲击。

光洒遍果园。
沟渠闪现银色，而后不再。
那池塘——我看见，当我把最后
一枚桃子放入水中——满是鱼和眼睛。