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Miles

文章来源：未知文章作者：enread 发布时间：2023-12-21 07:59 字体： [大中小]　进入论坛

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Miles

Albert Goldbarth

. . . and although the Chinese police refused to allow me

into a town so near the border of Tibet,

and lifted guns to make their point, that afternoon

I played a game of pick-up basketball

with six of them: what hoops¹ freaks!—says

my friend D’s twenty-year-old son from an internet café. Perhaps

because I’m from a certain generation and a certain unsophisticated

socioeconomic class, this casual ability to travel the planet

astonishes me: I worry how to tip in foreign currency

in a cab with the rigor² that someone else might bring

to saving a marriage or forging a Middle East peace treaty.

And travel is astonishing; on the weeks-long

rat-infested vomit-sour voyage in steerage

from his shtetl in the “Old World” to America,

my grandpa Louie was ordered into the sunlight once,

to help in heaving cargo³, and the passengers he saw there

—with their parasols and top hats, with their monocles

and their jaunty⁴ straw boaters, and white,

white clothes that had never contacted toil⁵, “oont

vun vooman hass a green birt on her shoulder

mit a golt chain, OONT IT TALKS!“—these

were as amazing to him as the fearsome tribes of cyclops,

and the turbulent rivers of liquid gold, and the roc

that could carry an elephant back to its nest,

that other, earlier travelers vouched⁶ for.

Herodotus swears that far-off tribes of people exist

whose semen is black. And there are mermaids⁷. Flying

mountains. When he journeyed across the brutal⁸

Gobi Desert, Marco Polo heard of the spirits there, “they

call a man by his name and so lead him astray,” or

one might hear “the tramp and hum of a great

ghost cavalcade⁹ and the sound of drums.” In 1930

when Karl Jansky heard, for the first time, spritz

and sizzle from his radio antennae¹⁰, he was traveling

—but in time, and for billions of years—and stood there

befuddled¹¹ and charmed in the snow of ghosts

we know now are the background radiation of the universe’s

birth from out of Nothing. All of those lone¹² adventurers

challenging the Atlantic in a dinghy, or the sky

in a chair and 700 helium balloons . . . can we compare this

to the anomalous¹³ praying mantis¹⁴ found on a window ledge¹⁵

on the forty-seventh floor of the Empire State Building?

How many thousands of miles was it, when my friend Dan

left his honeymoon¹⁶ bed—for better or worse,

the phone was on—and drove for an hour to Belle¹⁷ Plain

where the nursing home was, that had called to say

its dim, forensic-smelling halls now held

his mother’s corpse¹⁸? Another question is what

my grandpa Louie thought, when this photo was taken

in 1958. A little old man, a barely acclimatized immigrant Yid

who’s stepped from some joke or textbook example, more

at home with a samovar and a Torah and a seder cup

than anything from the Buy-4-Less. I’m ten,

and out of the frame, as is my pal¹⁹ Llewellyn,

who’s tossed a basketball into the air (and into

the frame), and yelled “Hey, catch!” so that

my grandfather—he who has possibly never beheld²⁰,

much less held, such an object—instinctively grabs it

out of the blue, and stares with a goggling²¹ wonder at

this globe of an alien world.

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收听单词发音

1 hoops
n.箍( hoop的名词复数 )；（篮球）篮圈；（旧时儿童玩的）大环子；（两端埋在地里的）小铁弓
参考例句：
a barrel bound with iron hoops 用铁箍箍紧的桶 Hoops in Paris were wider this season and skirts were shorter. 在巴黎，这个季节的裙圈比较宽大，裙裾却短一些。来自飘（部分）

2 rigor
n.严酷，严格，严厉
参考例句：
Their analysis lacks rigor.他们的分析缺乏严谨性。\|\|The crime will be treated with the full rigor of the law.这一罪行会严格依法审理。

3 cargo
n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物
参考例句：
The ship has a cargo of about 200 ton.这条船大约有200吨的货物。 A lot of people discharged the cargo from a ship.许多人从船上卸下货物。

4 jaunty
adj．愉快的，满足的；adv.心满意足地，洋洋得意地；n.心满意足；洋洋得意
参考例句：
She cocked her hat at a jaunty angle.她把帽子歪戴成俏皮的样子。 The happy boy walked with jaunty steps.这个快乐的孩子以轻快活泼的步子走着。

5 toil
vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事
参考例句：
The wealth comes from the toil of the masses.财富来自大众的辛勤劳动。 Every single grain is the result of toil.每一粒粮食都来之不易。

6 vouched
v.保证( vouch的过去式和过去分词 )；担保；确定；确定地说
参考例句：
He vouched his words by his deeds. 他用自己的行动证明了自己的言辞。来自《简明英汉词典》 Have all those present been vouched for? 那些到场的人都有担保吗？来自互联网

7 mermaids
n.（传说中的）美人鱼( mermaid的名词复数 )
参考例句：
The high stern castle was a riot or carved gods, demons, knights, kings, warriors, mermaids, cherubs. 其尾部高耸的船楼上雕满了神仙、妖魔鬼怪、骑士、国王、勇士、美人鱼、天使。来自辞典例句 This is why mermaids should never come on land. 这就是为什么人鱼不应该上岸的原因。来自电影对白

8 brutal
adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的
参考例句：
She has to face the brutal reality.她不得不去面对冷酷的现实。 They're brutal people behind their civilised veneer.他们表面上温文有礼，骨子里却是野蛮残忍。

9 cavalcade
n.车队等的行列
参考例句：
A cavalcade processed through town.马车队列队从城里经过。 The cavalcade drew together in silence.马队在静默中靠拢在一起。

10 antennae
n.天线；触角
参考例句：
Sometimes a creature uses a pair of antennae to swim.有时某些动物使用其一对触须来游泳。 Cuba's government said that Cubans found watching American television on clandestine antennae would face three years in jail.古巴政府说那些用秘密天线收看美国电视的古巴人将面临三年监禁。

11 befuddled
adj.迷糊的，糊涂的v.使烂醉( befuddle的过去式和过去分词 )；使迷惑不解
参考例句：
He was befuddled by drink. 他喝得迷迷糊糊的。 John is very amusing when he is completely befuddled. 当约翰喝得完全糊涂了的时候，他非常有趣儿。来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

12 lone
adj.孤寂的，单独的；唯一的
参考例句：
A lone sea gull flew across the sky.一只孤独的海鸥在空中飞过。 She could see a lone figure on the deserted beach.她在空旷的海滩上能看到一个孤独的身影。

13 anomalous
adj.反常的；不规则的
参考例句：
For years this anomalous behaviour has baffled scientists.几年来这种反常行为让科学家们很困惑。 The mechanism of this anomalous vascular response is unknown.此种不规则的血管反应的机制尚不清楚。

14 mantis
n.螳螂
参考例句：
Praying mantis has two powerful claws like sharp knives.螳螂有一对强壮的爪子，它们像锋利的刀。 In her mind,it was a female mantis,devouring her mates.她的意识中，是一只雌螳螂正吞咽她的配偶。

15 ledge
n.壁架，架状突出物；岩架，岩礁
参考例句：
They paid out the line to lower him to the ledge.他们放出绳子使他降到那块岩石的突出部分。 Suddenly he struck his toe on a rocky ledge and fell.突然他的脚趾绊在一块突出的岩石上，摔倒了。

16 honeymoon
n.蜜月（假期）；vi.度蜜月
参考例句：
While on honeymoon in Bali,she learned to scuba dive.她在巴厘岛度蜜月时学会了带水肺潜水。 The happy pair are leaving for their honeymoon.这幸福的一对就要去度蜜月了。

17 belle
n.靓女
参考例句：
She was the belle of her Sunday School class.在主日学校她是她们班的班花。 She was the belle of the ball.她是那个舞会中的美女。

18 corpse
n.尸体，死尸
参考例句：
What she saw was just an unfeeling corpse.她见到的只是一具全无感觉的尸体。 The corpse was preserved from decay by embalming.尸体用香料涂抹以防腐烂。

19 pal
n.朋友，伙伴，同志；vi.结为友
参考例句：
He is a pal of mine.他是我的一个朋友。 Listen,pal,I don't want you talking to my sister any more.听着，小子，我不让你再和我妹妹说话了。

20 beheld
v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟
参考例句：
His eyes had never beheld such opulence. 他从未见过这样的财富。来自《简明英汉词典》 The soul beheld its features in the mirror of the passing moment. 灵魂在逝去的瞬间的镜子中看到了自己的模样。来自英汉文学 - 红字

21 goggling
v.睁大眼睛瞪视，（惊讶的）转动眼珠( goggle的现在分词 )
参考例句：

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