中文导读
《诗章》（The Cantos）是庞德毕生心血之作，从1915年动笔至1969年去世仍未完成，最终留下120首诗章及若干残篇。这部史诗以多语言（英、意、中、法、拉丁、普罗旺斯语交织）书写，横跨从古希腊到当代的文明史，核心关切是：什么样的社会秩序能实现正义与美？诗中大量引用历史文献、经济论著、孔子经典、杰斐逊书信，构成一座庞大的"纸上文明博物馆"。以下选录三首早期重要诗章。
Canto I
And then went down to the ship,
Set keel to breakers, forth on the godly sea, and
We set up mast and sail on that swart ship,
Bore sheep aboard her, and our bodies also
Heavy with weeping, and winds from sternward
Bore us out onward with bellying canvas,
Circe's this craft, the trim-coifed goddess.
Then sat we amidships, wind jamming the tiller,
Thus with stretched sail, we went over sea till day's end.
Sun to his slumber, shadows o'er all the ocean,
Came we then to the bounds of deepest water,
To the Kimmerian lands, and peopled cities
Covered with close-webbed mist, unpierced ever
With glitter of sun-rays
Nor with stars stretched, nor looking back from heaven
Swartest night stretched over wretched men there.
The ocean flowing backward, came we then to the place
Aforesaid by Circe.
Here did they rites, Perimedes and Eurylochus,
And drawing sword from my hip
I dug the ell-square pitkin;
Poured we libations unto each the dead,
First mead and then sweet wine, water mixed with white flour.
Then prayed I many a prayer to the sickly death's-heads;
As set in Ithaca, sterile bulls of the best
For sacrifice, heaping the pyre with goods,
A sheep to Tiresias only, black and a bell-sheep.
Dark blood flowed in the fosse,
Souls out of Erebus, cadaverous dead,
Of brides and youths, and of much-bearing old
And virgins minded sore, and tender, first
With their youth about them, and many a wound,
Brazen, given by the bronze spear-point.
Came they, thronging, from the gloom, and clustered
Round the fresh blood, and I addressed them with my questions.
First Elpenor, unburied, cast we not
Over the pale sea-gull's passage,
But him we left behind us, unwept, unburied,
For other cares were ours and another errand.
"O Odysseus,
Not even in death have you forgotten your clever ways;
How is it that you have come to the house of darkness,
Yet living, seeing the dead, and the sun still shining?"
Canto XIII
Kung walked
by the dynastic temple
and into the cedar grove,
then out by the lower river,
and he said: "The blossoms of the apricot
blow from the east to the west,
And I have tried to keep them from falling."
And he said: "This mound has been here for a thousand years,"
And: "If a man have not order within him
He can not spread order about him;
And if a man have not order within him
His family will not act with due order;
And if the prince have not this within him
He can not put order in his dominions."
And he said: "The oak-tree in the meadow
Was a single shoot, and the pine
Was once no bigger than a thumb,
And they are now timber and pillars."
And he said: "The ceremonies
Are the outward expression of the inner meaning,
The end of the song is the beginning of the dance."
Canto XLV
With usura hath no man a house of good stone
each block cut smooth and well fitting
that devise might join with their adjoining,
with usura
hath no man a painted paradise on his church wall
harpes et luth
or where virgin receiveth message
and halo projects from incision,
with usura
seeth no man Gonzaga his heirs and his concubines
no picture is made to endure nor to live with
but it is made to sell and sell quickly
with usura, sin against nature,
is thy bread ever more of stale rags
is thy bread dry as paper,
with no mountain wheat, no strong flour
with usura the line grows thick
with usura there is no clear demarcation
and no man can find site for his dwelling.
Stonecutter is kept from his stone
weaver is kept from his lood
WITH USURA
wool comes not to market
sheep bringeth no gain with usura
Usura is a murrain, usura
blunteth the needle in the maid's hand
and stoppeth the spinner's cunning. Pietro Lombardo
came not by usura
Duccio came not by usura
nor Pier della Francesca; Zuan Bellin' not by usura
nor was "La Calunnia" painted.
Came not by usura Angelico; came not Ambrogio Praedis,
No church of cut stone signed: Adamo me fecit.
Usura rusteth the chisel
It rusteth the craft and the craftsman
It gnaweth the thread in the loom; none learneth to weave
gold in her pattern;
azure is wrought by usura, and the scarlet is faded.
It slayeth the child in the womb
It stayeth the young man's courting
It hath brought palsey to bed, lyeth
between the young bride and her bridegroom
CONTRA NATURAM
They have brought whores for Eleusis
Corpses are set to banquet
at behest of usura.