The Home

I paced alone on the road across the field while the sunset was hiding its last gold like a miser.

   The daylight sank deeper into the darkness, and the widowed land, whose harvest had been reaped, lay silent.

   Suddenly a boy’s shrill voice rose into the sky. He traversed the dark unseen, leaving the track of his song across the hush of the evening.

   His village home lay there at the end of the wasted land, beyond the sugar-cane field, hidden among the shadows of the bananaand the slender areca-palm, the coconut and the dark green jark-fruit trees.

   I stopped for a moment in my lonely way under the starlight, and saw spread before me the darkened earth surrounding with her arms countless homes furnished with cradles and beds, mother’s hearts and evening lamps, and young lives glad with a gladness that knows nothing of its value for the world.

家

我独自走在穿越田地的小路上，夕阳如同一个吝啬鬼，正藏起它最后一点金子。

白昼渐渐没入深沉的黑暗之中，那已收割了的田野更加孤寂、沉默地躺在那里。

突然，天空中传来一个男孩尖锐的歌声，他正穿越看不见的黑暗，把他的歌声留在静谧的黄昏里，久久回荡。

他的家就在荒地边缘的村落里，穿过甘蔗园，在香蕉树和瘦长的槟榔树后面，椰树和深绿色的榴莲的阴影里。

我在星光下独自行走，途中停留了片刻，幽暗的大地正在我面前展开。用他的双臂拥抱着无数的家庭，在那里有摇篮和床铺，有母亲们的心和夜晚的灯笼，还有年轻的生命，自然而欢乐，却全然不知这欢乐对于世界的价值。