文学与艺术诗歌:诗歌Ikon:TheHarrowingofHell_英文诗词
by denise levertov
down through the tomb's inward arch
he has shouldered out into limbo
to gather them, dazed, from dreamless slumber:
the merciful dead, the prophets,
the innocents just his own age and those
unnumbered others waiting here
unaware, in an endless void he is ending
now, stooping to tug at their hands,
to pull them from their sarcophagi,
dazzled, almost unwilling. didmas,
neighbor in death, golgotha dust
still streaked on the dried sweat of his body
no one had washed and anointed, is here,
for sequence is not known in limbo;
the promise, given from cross to cross
at noon, arches beyond sunset and dawn.
all these he will swiftly lead
to the paradise road: they are safe.
that done, there must take place that struggle
no human presumes to picture:
living, dying, descending to rescue the just
from shadow, were lesser travails
than this: to break
through earth and stone of the faithless world
back to the cold sepulchre, tearstained