Summer is late, my heart.
Words plucked out of the air
some forty years ago
when I was wild with love
and torn almost in two
scatter like leaves this night
of whistling wild and rain.
It is my heart that's late,
it is my song that's flown.
Outdoors all afternoon
under a gunmetal sky
staking my garden down,
I kneeled to the crickets trilling
underfoot as if about
to burst from their crusty shells;
and like a child again
marveled to hear so clear
and brave a music pour
from such a small machine.
What makes the engine go?
Desire, desire, desire.
The longing for the dance
stirs in the buried life.
One season only, and it's done.
So let the battered old willow
thrash against the windowpanes
and the house timbers creak.
Darling, do you remember
the man you married? Touch me,
remind me who I am.
Stanley Kunitz, 猶太人，1905 年生，至少活到一百歲。 這首詩據說寫於 1995 年，也就是他 90 歲的時候。 詩裡的 Darling 是他在 1957 年第三度婚姻的妻子 Elise Asher (1913--2004)。 Kunitz 的第一次婚姻 (Helen Pearce) 在 1935 年結束，第二次 (Eleanor Evans, 一位紅髮女演員) 持續 13 年 (1939--1952) 育有一女 Gretchen。 他在 1962 年買下麻州 Provincetown 的莊園，面海而有大面積的花園， 這首詩所說的 garden 就在此處。