母亲，就是这片土地  

Mother，the Name of This Land

       母亲是一个普通的农村妇女，从我记事起，她在我心目中就非常崇高、圣洁。时至今日，我已到了耳顺之年，母亲在我心目中的崇高与圣洁仍丝毫未减，尽管母亲离开我们已经20多年了。

       Mother was no different from the average women in the village and, ever since I came to remember things, she had remained sacred and lofty in my heart. Even today, when I have arrived at an age ( in my sixties ) upon which everything seems positive for my ear, my mother still stands nothing less than sacred and lofty in my mind’s eye after all these 20 years since she left us.

       母亲解放前出生于江淮丘陵上的一个农户家庭。由于贫困，母亲兄弟5人中，有2个夭折，一个妹妹抱给人家做了童养媳。作为姐姐，她对唯一的弟弟、我的舅舅十分疼爱。看到别人的孩子上学，舅舅也想去，但家里吃了上顿没下顿的，舅舅不敢开口。母亲拉着舅舅，反复向外公恳求。外公终于同意舅舅上学。为了供舅舅读书，母亲白天下地干活，晚上在昏暗的油灯下纺纱织布，纺织江淮一带妇女梳头时戴在头上的网子，再托人捎到镇上去卖，换点零钱给舅舅。只有舅舅知道，为了供他上学，母亲付出了怎样的辛劳。母亲去世时，50多岁的舅舅和我们兄妹一样失声痛哭。

       My mother was born into a farmer’s house in a village located in the hill area in between South China’s Yangtze River and Huaihe Rivers. Due to poor living conditions, of the five brothers and sisters, two died young and her younger sister was adopted by another family to be their son’s would-be-wife. As an elder sister, she was specially fond of her brother, my uncle who seeing others go to school wished to have such a chance himself. It was impossible for him to do so as there was scarcely enough food for the whole family and he dared not ask for such a thing. Holding his hand in hers, my mother would repeatedly ask my grandpa to grant him a chance. And my grandpa finally agreed to it. To help provide the fee, my mother would do some handcraft under the oil lamp after having toiled the whole day in the field. She would make the nets that helped fasten the hair of women which was a common hair style for ladies in the area. These nets she made would be sold in the nearby town. The little sum of cash would all serve as tuition fee for her younger brother, my Little Uncle who alone knew how hard my mother had been working for his schooling. When my mother passed away, my uncle, who was already 50 years old, cried as loudly as my brothers and sisters.

      母亲23岁那年，嫁到离家100多里外皖西的一个小山村。母亲先后养育了我们兄妹6人。由于父亲在外，很少顾得上家，一家子的生活重担几乎全部落在了母亲肩上。母亲身高不到1．60米，但栽秧割稻，挑水担草，庄稼地里的一应农活都靠她做。最难的是秋收季节分粮食、稻草、地瓜秧什么的，全靠肩挑人扛。那丘陵地带的路全都坑坑洼洼高低不平，有的田埂窄得连对面来人都走不过去，遇到天阴下雨，一脚下去陷得老深。母亲就用那单薄的身躯，在如此难走的路上，不断地为我们挑回粮食，挑回柴草，挑回全家的希望。待我十五六岁时，放学回家路上遇到队里分东西，就要和母亲一起去。母亲不让，我执拗要去。母亲无奈，自己挑一担，让我挑半担。母亲怕我累着，扁担一上肩，就飞快地往前走，走一条田埂远，再折回来接我。我们母子俩就这样一段一段地挪。有一年大旱，自留地的地瓜苗栽不上。晚上，母亲带着我和大弟弟挑水栽地瓜苗。水塘离地有半里多路，母亲用两副水桶换着挑，先挑来一担水让我和大弟弟边浇边栽苗，她再挑另一担。自留地中间有一段坟地，弟弟和我都有一点怕。母亲挑着水，老远老远就气喘吁吁地喊我和弟弟的名字。我们便忙着大声回答。一时间，夜空里回荡的净是我们母子焦灼的呼应。

       At the age of 23, my mother was married off into a small village some 50 miles away from her home in the west of Anhui Province. She raised up all 6 of us on her own as my father was often on various jobs away from home unable to take care of the family. As a result, the heavy burden of the whole household fell on my mother whose height remained less then 1.6 meters. Yet planting rice shoots and harvesting crops, fetching water from the well and cutting grass from the field, she had to do all the field work and household chores. The most heavy work would be harvesting all the different crops, carrying all the rice stalks and sweet potatoes from the field along rugged little paths in the hill area and some times walking on field ridges that allowed only one person on it. On rainy days, her foot would sink deep into the muddy field. Weak and fragile as her body was, my mother carried back home from the field our food, fire wood and, our hope. Round the age 15 on my way back from school, I would ask for permission to help her carry back things from the field but she never allowed me to help her and only upon my repeated begging she would allowed me to carry half the load and she the whole thing. Even then with the whole load upon her shoulders she would walk very fast ahead of me and then putting down the load on the ground, she would turn back to help me with my load. Thus section by section along side of the field, we moved our things home. At one time, the whole area was hit by severe drought making it impossible to plant sweat potato shoots, my mother took me and my younger brother to help her carry water from the village pond which was half a mile away from the field. Using two pairs of pail, she would first fetch one pair of water from the pond and ask me and my brother to water the field, she would carry the other pair of pails away to the pond to get more water. There was a grave yard somewhere away from our field and my brother and I were pretty much scared and, my mother approaching us and breathing hard with the pair of pails one in her front and one in the back would first call out loud our names and we would answer her in as loud voices. The night air over the field then seemed to be filling up with our callings and answers.

       隆冬，母亲常在灯下为我们缝补衣衫。南方阴冷，家里又无多余的钱燃一盆炭火。缩在被子里的我们，见母亲一边做着针线活一边呵呵手，寻些热气，就催母亲休息。母亲只是答应，待我们一觉醒来，母亲仍在忽闪忽闪的煤油灯下飞针走线，仍是一会儿呵呵手，呵呵手。盛夏，忙碌一天之后，母亲总要在自家门前的空地上，洒点水，把地扫干净，摆上竹床，或者铺上凉席，安顿好我们兄妹，再面对满天的星星，给我们讲她那总也讲不完的故事。那时，我便想，母亲的故事真多啊，多得像天上的星星一样。多少年过去了，许多往事皆随岁月的流逝而淡忘，可母亲在冬天的夜晚一边呵着手，一边缝补衣服的神情；夏天，一边摇着蒲扇为我们拍打蚊子，一边讲着动人故事的情景，闭上眼睛，便涌现在我的眼前。

       All along deep winter evenings, I would see my mother doing some needle work under the oil lamp. Winter days in the south were cold and damp, we had no money to buy enough wood carbon to burn for heating the room. Curdled up in quilts, we would gaze at our mother breathing on her fingers to keep them from cold and ask her to go to bed early. My mother nodded and yet when we woke up a while later we would still see her busy sewing, the needle shuttling through the cloth and she breathing on her fingers all the time. In hot summer evenings, coming back from a whole day’s hard work in the field, she would go and get some water to sprinkle on the courtyard in front of our house. And having swept the whole ground clean, she would set our bamboo bed there or just lay down a whole sheet of bamboo bedding and, lying on the bamboo bed or just on the ground sheeting and gazing up at a whole galaxy of stars in the night sky, we would listened to her telling us one story after another. Then I would wonder how she had stored up so many wonderful stories which like the stars in the sky seemed endless. All these years have passed while many things have faded out of memory and yet the picture of my mother busy at her needle work while breathing upon her fingers during cold winter nights and that of summer evenings during which she waving rush fans to keep mosquitoes from bothering us told us endless stories remains clear and fresh in my mind. And whenever I close my eyes the picture would emerge right in my front.

       母亲为人善良，在邻里和我们家族中有口皆碑。父亲兄弟3人，母亲嫁给父亲后，和我大婶、二婶相处甚好，没听说她们因为什么事闹矛盾红过脸。分家时，叔叔婶子坚持把最好的4间房分给我父母。1960年，一把大火把大伯家的房子给烧了。父母合计，大伯家人多，便买了2间简易草房搬了进去，把原分得的4间房让给了大伯家。直到现在，那4间房仍是大伯家的孩子住。母亲人缘极好，村子里，有谁家夫妻吵架，有谁家婆媳怄气都愿意请母亲去劝说；谁家的儿子、姑娘大了，该成家了，也请她当月老，母亲也乐此不疲。父亲工作的油坊，有3个工人是孤儿。逢年过节，他们3个就成了我们家的座上客。有一次，母亲给父亲做了条裤子，看到3人中的小张冬天仅穿一条单裤冻得瑟瑟发抖，就送给小张了。为了给他们3人娶媳妇成家，母亲不知托过多少人。母亲去世时，他们3人和我们兄妹一起为母亲守灵。送葬时，既无讣告，也未声张，但方圆十里八乡的许多乡亲都来为母亲送行。

       My mother was gentle and kind towards all our neighbors whose lips would utter praises of her and among all members of our tribal family she enjoyed her rightful honor. After she was married with my father who has two brothers, my mother got on very well with my her sisters-in-laws, the wives of my two uncles. I never heard of anything unhappy in between them. When they divided up the family property, my uncles and aunties all insisted on giving the best 4 houses to my father and mother. In 1960, my uncle’s house was burnt down by a big fire. My parents decided to give the 4 houses to my uncle considering that theirs is a big family. And they bought two simple houses with thatched roof for themselves. Even today, my uncle’s children still live in those 4 houses. My mother was so well-known for her kindheartedness that whenever troubles broke out in between husband and wife and, even bickerings in between mother-in-laws and daughter-in-laws, they would bring in my mother to help smooth them out. When a son or daughter is grown of age for marriage, she would be invited as a go-betweener and she would be willing to busy herself for the errand. In the oil mill where my father worked, there were three young men and, during the holidays, the three of them would always be our honored guests. Once my mother made a pair of cotton-wadded trousers for my father and, upon seeing the legs of one of them, by the name of Xiao Zhang, tremble, she gave them to the young man. For the marriage of these three young men, my mother went out of the way searching far and wide for their happiness. Upon the death of my mother, they all came to keep watch in turns with my brothers and sisters at my mother’s side before burial. And all villagers turned out and even people from far-away villages came to see her off though we tried to keep it to ourselves with no obituary of any kind from my family.

       1970年，18岁的我和15岁的大弟弟同时从各自的学校接到了应征入伍的通知书，我俩高兴极了。高兴之余，我们心中又有些不安，刚刚能为母亲分担点家庭生活的担子，我们却要同时飞走了，母亲能同意吗？谁想，没等我们告诉母亲，她已听说了。那几天，她带我们走亲戚，别四邻，乐得脸上像绽开了一朵花。在我们去县里集合的前一晚，母亲和父亲整夜未睡，为我们煮鸡蛋，整行装。直到鸡叫两遍，我突然醒来，只见母亲仍在油灯下给我和弟弟赶做鞋垫。我睡意全无，望着灯光下两鬓斑白的母亲，深深体会到了“慈母手中线，游子身上衣”的蕴意。第二天一大早，母亲送我们到村头，双手搂过我们兄弟俩，在每人额头上亲一下。然后母亲从蓝布大襟上衣的口袋里掏出两个小红纸包，递给我和弟弟。我们打开一看，纸包里包着6元钱，我很清楚，当时家中还欠着生产队近400元的超支款，母亲给我们每人6元钱实在不容易啊。母亲嘱咐我们到了部队再困难也要好好干，没有过不去的火焰山。我们走出近一里地时，回头望去，寒风中，母亲仍站在村口的高坡上，不停地挥手。

       In the same year ( in 1970 ), my younger brother and I received permits to join the army. Aged 18 and 15, we were both at school and overjoyed at the news. But on second thoughts, we both felt uneasy and worried as we would leave home at a time and age when we could share some of our family burden. Would my mother agree to it? Who could have thought of it but my mother had heard of it and approved and even took us both to relatives and friends to bid them farewell, her face blooming with joy. The night before we two should report ourselves at the township government, my father and mother stayed awake the whole night through, boiling eggs and packing up. When the rooster had called twice I woke up to see my mother at her last need work under the oil lamp for the pairs of shoe cushion for my brother and me. Wide awake I stared at my mother noticing wisps of gray hair straying from both her temples and the familiar lines of the poem appeared in my mind, “the lines of needle work on the warm clothes of one far away from home bear witness to the hard labour from the hands of our kind mother.”  Early the next morning, my mother escorted my brother and me right to outside of our village, she hugged us both tightly and kissed on our foreheads. She then took out two little red paper bags and gave a bag to either of us. We opened the bag and found 6 yuan in it. We knew that mother had saved this little money though we still owed some 400 yuan to the village brigade. She told us to work hard no matter how difficult it proved to be and there should be no flaming mountain that we could not get over. We were almost half a mile away and, turning around, we still saw her standing in cold winter, waving her hand at us.

       母亲是那样地热爱生活、热爱家庭、热爱子女，可生活却带给她那么多磨难。她原本就体弱多病，后来又患子宫肌瘤做了大手术，由于术后营养跟不上，身体非常虚弱。对这一切，母亲都瞒着我们当兵的兄弟俩，封封家信报平安。只是几次信中，母亲都提出希望有机会到山东部队去一趟，看看我们仅相隔不到百里的兄弟俩。1980年春节前，我接到妻子的电报，说母亲小便带血已近2个月。我火速赶回家中，安排母亲住进了医院。病理化验结果无情地告诉我们，母亲患的是左肾上腺癌。除夕之夜，我陪在刚刚做了手术的母亲的床头，病房外万家灯火，鞭炮齐鸣。母亲说过年了，应该喝点酒。我买来红葡萄酒，妻子送来两样菜，正要举杯时，母亲让我去找护士要点盐水棉球给她擦擦牙。擦完，母亲缓缓地说，儿子，让妈妈亲亲你。我急忙将脸贴到母亲的脸上。

       Passionately, my mother loved life and her family and her sons and daughters. Yet life brought upon her too much pain and hardship. Her body already weak and frail, she had to suffer an operation to have a tumor removed from her womb. Thus she remained weak and fragile since the operation, with no good food and nourishment thereafter. And she kept both of us in the darkness and in all the letters from home she would say she was in good health. In a few letters, my mother said she wished to go to both armies to see my brother and me in Shandong Province as we two were stationed less than 100 miles apart. Some time before the Spring Festival, in 1980, I received a telegraph from my wife telling me that my mother had been in great pain for about two months blood being found in her urine. I hurried home and arranged a hospital bed for my mother. Test report was ruthless: my mother suffered from cancer on her left kidney. On the eve of the Spring Festival, I sat at the bedhead beside my mother after she had come out from the operation room. Outside the window, the night sky was lit up by colorful lights from all households and fireworks flashing all around. My mother said: “for this biggest holiday, you should have some wine.” I bought a bottle of red wine and my wife brought two simple dishes. As I raised up my cup, my mother stopped me and said that she would have the nurse bring some salt water and cotton sticks to clean her teeth with, for she wanted to kiss me. With her teeth cleaned, she said, very slowly, “son, I want to kiss you.”  Hurriedly, I put my cheek towards her lips.

       部队知道了母亲的病情，允许我续几天假，但母亲不让。她说，手术也做了，你又不是医生，在家里也不能治病，还是按时回去吧！我不是那个病（指癌症），你别担心。我知道，母亲暗地里一直在向医生护士打听她还能有多少日子。

       My army officers knew that my mother was still in poor condition and allowed me to stay with her a few more days but she would allow no such a thing saying that I was useless staying home for her care after the operation because I was not a doctor. And I should return back to the army when time was due for my leave. “I do not suffer that kind of disease ( meaning cancer ) “ she said, “and you should not worry about me.”  But I knew that she had all the time asked doctors and nurses as to the days still left for her.

       返队前一天晚上，我陪母亲回到家中。刚进家门，她就对我大妹说，你大哥爱吃鸡肝，杀只鸡给他做点鸡肝汤。鸡肝汤做好了，我说，妈，你喝一碗吧。母亲说，给你做的，你喝。母亲在一旁静静地看着我吃，脸上浮现出慈母所特有的满足和欣慰。强忍着内心的悲痛，我喝了那碗鸡肝汤。从那以后，无论什么山珍海味，都没有母亲让我喝的那碗鸡肝汤味美可口。

       The day before I returned back to the army, I accompanied my mother back home from the hospital. Upon stepping over the threshhold, my mother said to my younger sister: “your eldest brother loves eating chicken liver, so kill a chicken and make a stew soap of chicken liver for him.” When it was served on the table, I asked my mother to have a bowl first. But she said: “it is made for you and so you take it.”  Sitting beside me and just looking on quietly seemed to bring my mother extreme comfort and satisfaction. Trying very hard to keep my tears from welling up, I finished the liver soup. Ever since that time, no matter what rare delicious food from anywhere in the world is brought before me, I have no pallet for it compared to the chicken liver soup my mother cooked for me.

       第二天天刚亮，我要走了。母亲让我坐到她床前，抚摸着我的手说，你胃不好，比较瘦，不要老是熬夜，买些点心放着，夜里饿时吃点。在母亲眼里，儿子总是长不大的孩子。停了会儿她又说，你小弟快考高中了，我要能看到他考上大学就好了，说着眼角挂上了晶莹的泪花。当兵离家的10年中，我探过几次家，她老人家流泪，这还是第一次。

       At daybreak I was about to leave, my mother asked me to sit for a while beside her bed and, holding my hand in hers, she said: “your stomach is never so good and you are also quite thin and so, do not stay up during the  night every so often. Get some snacks handy and take some when you are hungry during the night. In your mother’s eyes, you remain a son who could never grow up.” She stopped for a while and continued: “your youngest brother is about to take the test for senior high school and how I wish to see him go to college.” Tears sparkled at the corners of her eyes and trickled down her cheeks as she finished off. During the 10 years while I was in the army, I came back home a dozen times, but this was the first time I saw her weep.

       医生说，母亲最多能维持6个月，然而母亲的病情好好坏坏，奇迹般地维持了3年多。1984年9月17日，我接到母亲病危的消息，与大弟同车往家中赶。在火车上，我俩极少说话，但心里都希望母亲能闯过这一关。

       The doctor said that there were only six months at most for my mother as she appeared to be faring well some time and very poorly some other time. However, a miracle happened that she lived more than 3 years. But on September 17th, 1984, I received news of my mother’s failing condition and got on the same train back home with my younger brother. We both remained quiet on the train hoping that mother could somehow get well this time.

       一进村口，我们便看见了家门口飘动的白幡。我心里一颤，急忙奔跑起来。跨进熟悉的低矮草房的小门，迎面便是一具冰冷的棺木。我扑在棺木上，再也控制不住自己的感情，失声痛哭起来。我执意要家人启开棺木，再次将脸贴在母亲脸上，我要让母亲像往常一样，再次亲我。我任眼泪像决堤的洪水，洒在母亲的面颊，洒在她的灵柩上。我诅咒老天爷竟如此不公平，让母亲才56岁就离开她温暖的家和魂牵梦绕的儿女。作为长子，连母亲想去部队看看两个儿子的心愿都未能实现，这成了我终生的遗憾。

       Upon entering the village, however, we saw white banners fluttering in the wind outside the gate of our house. Our heart sunk, we ran towards home. A cold coffin in the front room met our eyes as we entered our low thatch-roofed house. I threw myself on the coffin crying as loudly as my voice allowed me without caring at all about controlling myself. I insisted on opening the coffin so that I could again put my face to my mother’s lips for her kiss as she had kissed every so often. My tears were pouring down on my mother’s face as if breaking out of the river dam to flood the coffin. And I cursed heaven for its unfairness that my mother should pass away at the age of 56 and leave her warm home and all her beloved children whose dreams had been woven by her and around her. As the eldest son of the family, it still remains a regretful wish for my life time that my mother had been unable to go the army to see her two sons.

       母亲故去的日子里，我经常拿出母亲坐在自家院子、背后是泥土垒成的围墙的照片。这是我最珍贵的纪念，每次端详，我都能感受到强烈的母爱，仿佛又听到了母亲那极平凡的一句话——“没有过不去的火焰山”。

       Over all the years since my mother left us, I often took out the picture in which my mother sat before the wall built of mud blocks in the courtyard of our house and the picture remains to be the most precious of the memory of my mother. Whenever I look at my mother in the picture, I would feel my mother’s deep love for us and seem to be hearing the few simple words from her -- “there is no flaming mountain that you could not surmount.”

       母亲离开我们后，我们兄妹相约一起为她扫过一次墓。面对母亲的坟墓，我久久站立着。正是仲春时节，满山遍野，油菜花摇动着金色的波浪，飘散着阵阵清香。耀眼的金光中，我看见母亲颤巍巍地朝我们走来。母亲说，你们都大了，都能撑起一片天地了。我迎上几步，刚要唤出声来，却发现是自己的幻觉，眼前仍是一片金黄，阵阵清香。我在心里说，这金黄，这清香是土地给的。母亲就安眠在这片土地中，母亲就是这片土地。

       Upon one occasion when all 6 of us brothers and sisters managed to go together to see my mother during the Tomb Cleaning Festival, I stood before her grave for a long time. Gazing out all around me, I saw flowers blooming in all their rich colors at this time of the year in deep spring with rolling waves of cole flowers undulating and sending a faint aroma everywhere. In their glories shining all over the place I saw my mother coming to us in shaking steps and saying: “you are now all grown ups capable of holding up a piece of sky above you.” I hurried over to meet her and, almost calling out aloud, found that I was in a vision where all before me there was only a huge mass of yellow shimmering flowers with wafts of fragrant smell. I murmured to myself: “this golden air and this fragrant aroma are both given by the land where my mother sleeps in her quietude. Mother, that is the name of this land.”

       时至今日，每每想起母亲，心中自然升腾起一种信念：好好做人，好好做事，努力做一名合格的兵。这是母亲留给我的一辈子的财富。

       Even today, up till this very moment while missing my mother from moment to moment, I often feel an incense of faith arise from deep within my heart: try to be a good man, try to do everything well, and try hard to be a qualified soldier. These few simple words from my mother remain to be the greatest wealth to last me a whole life time.

作者：王登平 

英译：王锐平

责编：罗苴子

作者简介：王登平，男，汉族，1952年11月生，安徽肥西人，中央党校政治学专业研究生毕业。

历任战士、排长、政治指导员、军政治部干事、副处长，

总政宣传部副局长、局长，周克玉上将秘书。

海军青岛某基地副政委、青岛某保障基地政委等职，

海军装备部政委，全国人大代表。

2002年作为舰艇编队副指挥员，参加了中国海军首次环球航行，同年晋升少将。

2009年12月任海军北海舰队政治委员

2011年7月晋升中将。

2012年7月任广州军区副政委南海舰队政委。

2014年12月任中国人民解放军海军副政委。

2016年2月，退出中国人民解放军海军副政委现役，已年满64岁。

译者简介：王悦平，资深媒体人，原中国国际广播电台播音员。

责编简介：罗苴子，原名罗守松，资深媒体人，青年作家、诗人。中央统战部新的社会阶层人士服务团成员，云南省网络作家协会筹委会主任。新作诗集《诗意的漂泊》即将出版。