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18. Mowing
He takes up life simply with the small tasks.
There was never a sound beside the wood but one,
And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.
What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself;
Perhaps it was something about the heat of the sun,
Something, perhaps, about the lack of sound-
And that was why it whispered and did not speak.
It was no dream of the gift of idle hours,
Or easy gold at the hand of fay or elf:
Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak
To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows,
Not without feeble-pointed spikes of flowers
(Pale orchises), and scared a bright green snake.
The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.
My long scythe whispered and left the hay to make.
fay :백인, 여자이름, 신념
swale : 저습지, 움푹 팬 땅, 응달
feeble-pointed : 가냘픈
orchises : 난초, 육생란, 제비난속의 야생난초
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풀 베기
숲가에 나는 소리는 단 하나였다.
나의 긴 낫이 땅에게 속삭이는 소리였다.
무엇을 속삭이는 것일까? 나는 잘 몰랐다.
어쩌면 태양의 열(熱)에 관한 어떤 것이거나,
어쩌면 소리의 부재(不在)에 관한 어떤 것이었다―
그래서 말하지 않고 속삭였나보다.
그것은 한가한 시간이 선물한 꿈도 아니고,
요정들이 손쉽게 주무르는 금도 아니었다.
가끔 가냘픈 꽃 봉우리(창백한 난초)도 남기고,
번쩍이는 녹색 뱀도 질겁해 도망치게 하면서,
습지의 무성한 풀을 줄줄이 베는 진지한 사랑에게는
사실 말고는 모든 것이 짝 없이 나약한 것이다.
사실은 노동이 아는 가장 달콤한 꿈이다.
나의 긴 낫은 속삭이었고 풀은 건초가 되었다.
-신재실 옮김-
단상(斷想): 꿈은 이루어진다. 농부는 숲가의 늪지에서 건초용 풀을 벤다. 사방이 고요하고 뙤약볕이 그의 몸을 달군다. 낫이 땅―사실은 농부 자신―과 나누는 대화가 그의 귀에 들리는 유일한 소리다. 숭고한 태양의 열과 감도는 정적(靜寂)에 대한 경외감을 서로 나누는 소리인가? 그러기에 낮은 소리로 속삭이는 것인가? 어쨌든 그 뜻을 이해하기 힘들다. 하지만 분명한 것은 지금의 일이 결코 쉬운 일이 아니라는 것이다. 한가로운 시간의 꿈도 아니고, 신화적 환상도 아니다. 한마디로 장난이 아니다. 하지만 낫을 움직이는 농부의 손이 “진지한 사랑”과 결합할 때 늪지의 풀은 줄줄이 베어진다. 농부의 “진지한 사랑”은 연약한 꽃과 질겁해 달아나는 작은 뱀에게 연민의 사랑을 보내는 여유까지 즐긴다. 노동에 임하는 “진지한 사랑”은 노동을 놀이의 경지로 승화시킨다. 그 결과, 예컨대, 늪지의 풀은 “건초”로 변신한다. “사실은 노동이 아는 가장 달콤한 꿈이다.” 건초의 “꿈”이 “사실”이 된 것이다. 이처럼 꿈은 이루어진다. 다만 “진지한 사랑”과 결합할 때 그것이 가능하다. 진인사대천명(盡人事待天命)이라 했던가?
-신재실 씀-
출처 : http://blog.naver.com/PostList.nhn?from=postList&blogId=js9660&categoryNo=31¤tPage=63
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https://youtu.be/xQHE5f5j3Og?list=PLLSMGHNW3o1n0DrMi55fzi18YydmOPPGD
https://youtu.be/1d2HniyjtVE?list=OLAK5uy_l4k2ObJUMCEroFFmDz0oExtPCH4SnEsu0
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“Mowing” (1913)
In this irregular sonnet, the characteristically New
England Frost presents an image of hard farm labor,
as in his “After Apple-Picking.” Robert Faggen
writes that “Frost’s allegiance to the pursuit and
love of fact is apparent” in this poem, noting that it
was Frost’s “favorite poem of his first book (A Boy’s
Will)” (45). One of his most quoted lines, “The fact
is the sweetest dream that labor knows,” appears as
part of the memorable closing couplet.
The poem opens with the sound of a “scythe
whispering to the ground” as a fellow does a hard
day’s work while speculating about the sound his
scythe makes beside the wood. He wonders what
his scythe whispers and why it whispers instead of
speaking. His labor is a sweet dream and an “ear
nest love,” something he does with great passion
but also something he does not know well himself.
He knows that it is not the “dream of the gift of idle
hours” and that the golden hay that he mows is not
caused by a fairy or elf. Instead, it is his love that
lays the “swale in rows,” the rhythmic motion keep
ing him from fully absorbing the act himself. As
Faggen asserts, the poem “reflects a desire to unify
work and play . . . but also expresses the frustration
of limited revelation” (45).
The second half of the poem is somewhat elu
sive. The speaker tells the truth about the love he
has for his labor, as “[a]nything more than the
truth would seem too weak” but it is unclear what
would be more than the truth. The whispering of
his scythe is the same action of which the scythe
cannot speak. It is the whispering that scares the
snake, the truth of its purpose that lays the land in
rows. It whispers something about the truth to the
land, something about a farmer’s encroachment,
something about what he mows down. It is the
technology of the scythe, the force of it. It is the
laying of the land that spares some “feeble-pointed
spikes of flowers.” Faggen writes that “the persis
tence of flowers reminds the mower of his weak
ness, his inability to control completely the
environment and his unwitting participation in the
creation of stronger forms” (48). But the flowers
are feeble in relation to the scythe, as are the
snakes. The fact of what the speaker can do with
his labor—the immediate effects of his labor—is
what he hopes for as a reward. There is no long
term guessing about his actions. There is an imme
diacy in mowing something down, as there is in
making something, that is “the sweetest dream that
labor knows.” The next task is in the distance, and
this scythe will leave the “hay to make,” will leave
disorder behind for the tossing of a pitchfork.
Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren com
ment that “. . . Man is set off from nature because
he is capable of the ‘dream,’ because he is an ideal
creating being. . . . But man is also of nature, he
fulfills himself in the world of labor and his ideals
develop from the real world; he does not get his
ideals from some Platonic realm of perfect ‘Ideas,’
but must create them from his experience and
imagination” (371). Neither the speaker nor the
reader is told what is whispered; both are left only
to theorize. It seems, however, that the scythe and
the ground have a special relationship, one that is
just beyond human perception. Perhaps an under
standing of nature will always be just beyond our
grasp.
Two further considerations might lend some
insight. John H. Timmerman writes that “Frost
supplies a metacommentary on poetics in the
poem” (44) and that “[i]f the poem is successful,
the reader stores the hay the poet has cut” (45). Jay
Parini observes that mowing is also a traditional
euphemism for lovemaking.
Despite the cruelty and brutality of the scythe,
there is a rhythmic and lulling beauty to its whis
per. See TECHNOLOGY.
FURTHER READING
Beach-Viti, Ethel. “Frost’s ‘Mowing,’ ” Explicator 40,
no. 4 (Summer 1982): 45–46.
Brooks, Cleanth, and Robert Penn Warren. Under
standing Poetry. 3rd ed. New York: Holt, Rinehart
and Winston, 1960, 371.
Elder, John. “The Poetry of Experience,” New Literary
History 30, no. 3 (Summer 1999): 649–659.
Faggen, Robert. Robert Frost and the Challenge of Dar
win. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press,
1997, 45–48.
Lentricchia, Frank. “The Resentments of Robert
Frost.” In Out of Bounds: Male Writers and
Gender(ed) Criticism, edited by Laura Claridge and
Elizabeth Lanland, 268–289. Amherst: University
of Mass Press, 1990.
McInery, Stephen. “ ‘Little Forms’: Four Poems and a
Developing Theme of Robert Frost,” Critical Review
40 (2000): 59–74.
Parini, Jay. Robert Frost: A Life. New York: Holt, 1999.
Paton, Priscilla M. “Robert Frost: ‘The fact is the
sweetest dream that labor knows,’ ” American Liter
ature 53, no. 1 (March 1981): 43–55.
Scott, Mark. “Andrew Lang’s ‘Scythe Song’ Becomes
Robert Frost’s ‘Mowing’: Frost’s Practice of Poetry,”
Robert Frost Review (Fall 1991): 30–38.
Timmerman, John H. Robert Frost: The Ethics of Ambi
guity. Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University Press,
2002, 40–45.
Vail, Dennis. “Frost’s ‘Mowing’: Work and Poetry,”
Notes on Contemporary Literature 4, no. 1 (1974):
4–8.
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Robert Frost and the Challenge of Darwin(2001) - Robert Faggen, pp. 46~7
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道德經 王弼本 80. 小國寡民(나라는 작고 백성은 적으니)
小國寡民,
使有什佰之器而不用, 使民重死而不遠徙,
雖有舟輿, 無所乘之, 雖有甲兵, 無所陳之,
使人復結繩而用之,
甘其食, 美其服, 安其居, 樂其俗,
隣國相望, 鷄犬之聲相聞, 民至老死不相往來.