此行的目的有二：感受集中營和辛波絲卡。可是，在殘破的街巷裡，我只能感受辛波微弱的氣息，甚至未能尋見她的影子。但她的詩我都記著，並且在心中默念，企圖把它印刻在別緻的牆壁。恰巧地，某一夜，我和一個法國男子在昏黃的街燈下漫步，穿梭於橫街雜巷間，暢談瑣事，這一幕，好比她詩的情節。
Wislawa Szymborska
Both are convinced
that a sudden surge of emotion bound them together.
Beautiful is such a certainty,
but uncertainty is more beautiful.
Because they didn't know each other earlier, they suppose that
nothing was happening between them.
What of the streets, stairways and corridors
where they could have passed each other long ago?
I'd like to ask them
whether they remember-- perhaps in a revolving door
ever being face to face?
an "excuse me" in a crowd
or a voice "wrong number" in the receiver.
But I know their answer:
no, they don't remember.
They'd be greatly astonished
to learn that for a long time
chance had been playing with them.
Not yet wholly ready
to transform into fate for them
it approached them, then backed off,
stood in their way
and, suppressing a giggle,
jumped to the side. There were signs, signals:
but what of it if they were illegible.
Perhaps three years ago,
or last Tuesday
did a certain leaflet fly
from shoulder to shoulder?
There was something lost and picked up.
Who knows but what it was a ball
in the bushes of childhood.
There were doorknobs and bells
on which earlier
touch piled on touch.
Bags beside each other in the luggage room.
Perhaps they had the same dream on a certain night,
suddenly erased after waking.
Every beginning
is but a continuation,
and the book of events
is never more than half open.
