Sex Perhaps

Kathryn Starbuck

A half century ago I was a welcoming port of call in 

             a buoyant（轻快的） place, a person to drop in on or 

 drop out of, adrift in a private sea of stormy 

             inwardness, trying to love myself with 

 conviction. The only ideas to reach my calm outer 

             deck fell off my young lovers' backs as they 

 unburdened themselves. 

They sought authenticity, oblivion, and an exportable 

             knowledge. They had aspirations. They 

 wanted to become painters or poets or -- two of 

             them -- painters and poets, eager to face 

 a decade or lifetime of envy and disappointment. 

             Why do you aspire（渴望，追求）, I asked, don't you know, 

 silly boys, that either you are or you aren't? 

They weren't. Neither was I. Oh how complacent 

             I was in my ignorant omnipotence（全能）: float to 

 sea with me, I urged, where we can embody no plan, 

             no hope, achieve nothing worth dying or 

 living for except perhaps the melancholy luster 

             of delicious duty-free hand-me-down trips 

 to bed and back. 

Did I know then that in a flash we'd be ancient, 

             that we'd be tending shrines and gardens 

 and graves? Did I not know then that the honey we'd 

             so innocently spread would attract the mob 

 intellect of fire ants to bedevil（使痛苦，虐待） us in the night? How 

             did I know I'd outlive us all to become, at 

 last, a port of call I've come to call my own?