1. Check; 2. Sylvia Plath: Widow

1. Check

老板有个夏屋，笑话夏屋的邻居，一个夏天住在那里，家里有四个小秃子，爹妈也不带他们上湖里玩；好不容易见到他们出船了，老板的老婆就说：water sports: check. 带儿子们下过湖，一个夏天就算打发了，任务就完成了。

我们也 check 了：总算有了一点点雪，也总算有了一点点时间，拖了大毛二毛，去村里的小park玩 sledding. 那里人很多，也都是爹妈们在 check.

这个 check，还是从二毛那里学来的。我问二毛什么事情，他不说 yes,只说 check, check 几回以后，我总算明白了他的意思。：）

写了下面的贴，终究还是不舒服，大过年的整得一个惨兮兮的又是何苦来。又高兴了，check.：）

2. Sylvia Plath: Widow
几年前，M的女儿将出世时，她说，她和丈夫准备要三个孩子。后来她又生了一个儿子。老三还没有的时候，丈夫病了。癌症。一年后就去世了。

又过了一年，我又见到她。三十出头的女人，已是半头的白发，怀中两个年幼的孩子。小儿子拿起玩具电话，装着拨号，说，I want to call my daddy. 他永远不会有关于父亲的记忆。

M决定搬回欧洲娘家了，我们去给她送行。在一个小学的操场。她陈列了很多照片，主要是她丈夫和孩子们的。还有一张，很漂亮的一群年轻女子。也有她自己。她染了头发，皱纹也平复了一些，看起来又有了神采。照片上大家都在对着镜头笑，嫵媚妖娆。

我好奇，说，她们都是谁。

她脸上还是笑着，说，This is our support group. We are all, you know, widows.

Widow. 这一个字就如闪电一般击垮了我，眼泪哗地涌了出来。

是新年了，给父母打电话，给公婆打电话，给姐妹打电话。国内今年又允许人放编炮了，于是只能往电话里吼，吼的什么却是谁也听不清。放下电话怆然若失，这一年过去，掰着手指头数数，我少了一个伯伯，少了一个叔叔。妹妹的公公去世了，家里人搞不清老规矩，于是按照大家所能记得的最严格规矩守孝：新年头三天，大家都不出门，只在家“守”着。

这里也有聚会，教会的，中文学校的，虽然不乐意，也还是都去了。照例也都是有演出。演出时，载歌载舞最抢眼的一位女子，也是三十多岁，也是新寡。也是癌症，三十八岁。一群半老徐娘中，只有她最生动耀眼。她是一名寡妇。我无法摆脱这个念头。

“孀”是带着富贵气的，那“死鬼”要么有钱，要么有势，而且大约是寿终正寝的，这位孀女士也该是上了年纪的，既然没有人是可以长生不老的，命运也不能算是对她太刻薄。最过凄惨的，是那年轻的寡妇，年轻的丈夫没有信守自己的承诺，撕毁了合同，撒手西去，留给她寂寞的长夜，冰冷的床褥，失去了合伙人的项目——生活。

死亡，是一个男人对女人的最大背叛。尤其是英年早逝。虽然说他也无能为力。

Widow
By Sylvia Plath.

Widow. The word consumes itself-
Body, a sheet of newsprint on the fire
Levitating a numb minute in the updraft
Over the scalding, red topography
that will put her heart out like an only eye.

Widow. The dead syllable, with its shadow
Of an echo, exposes the panel on the wall
Behind which the secret passage lies-stale air,
Fusty rememberances, the coiled-spring stair
That opens at the top into nothing at all....

Widow. The bitter spider sits
And sits in the center of her loveless spokes.
Death is the dress she wears, her hat and her collar.
The moth-face of her husband, moonwhite and ill,
Circles her like a prey she'd love to kill

A second time, to have him near again-
A paper image to lay against her heart
The way she laid his letters, till they grew warm and seemed to give her warmth, like live skin. But it is she who is paper now, warmed by no one.

Widow: that great, vacant estate!
The voice of God is full of draftiness,
Promising simply the hard staresm the space
Of immortal blackness between stars
And no bodies, singing like arrows up to heaven.

Widow, the compassionate trees bend in,
The trees of loneliness, the trees of mourning.
They stand like shadows about the green landscape-
Or even like black holes cut out of it.
A widow resembles them, a shadow-thing,

Hand folding hand, and nothing in between.
A bodiless soul could pass another soul
In this clear air and never notice it-
One soul pass through the otherm frail as smoke
And utterly ignorant of the way it took.

That is the fear she has-the fear
His soul may beat and be beating at her dull sense
Like blue Mary's angel, dove-like against a pane
Blinded to all but the grey spiritless room
It looks in on, and must go on looking in on.