Chapter 11

Chapter 11 The Silence Was a Bulldozer metaphor (n) a figure of speech that says that one thing is another different thing as a way to compare the two and note their similarities; for example: "my mother is a battleship" or "school was a rollercoaster" Mrs. Overton was sitting at her desk when the class filed in on Friday morning. Evan thought she looked really tired. "How's Langston?" asked Christopher, dropping his completed love poem in the In basket on Mrs. Overton's desk. "Better. He was very sick yesterday. We spent the whole day at the animal hospital. He has pneumonia, which is serious for a cat as old as Langston. But the vet gave him some medicine

第11章沉默是推土机比喻(n)一种修辞手法，表示一件事是另一件不同的事情，以比较两者并注意它们的相似之处；例如：“我妈妈是一艘战舰”或“学校是过山车”星期五早上，当学生们鱼贯而来的时候，奥弗顿夫人正坐在她的书桌前。 埃文觉得她看起来真的很累。 “兰斯顿怎么样了？”克里斯托弗问，把他写好的情诗放进奥弗顿夫人书桌上的收信篮里。 ”更好。他昨天病得很重。 我们在动物医院呆了一整天。 他得了肺炎，这对兰斯顿这么大的猫来说是很严重的。 但是兽医给了他一些药

and said he's going to be fine." A bunch of kids were gathered around Mrs. Overton's desk to hear the latest on Langston's health and to hand in their love poems. Evan noticed another group, mostly girls, huddled around Jessie's desk. They wanted to know if Jessie had finished tallying the results of the survey, but Jessie wasn't giving anything away. Not yet. Slowly, Evan pulled a piece of paper out of his backpack. He wished the kids standing around the teacher's desk would go back to their seats. He watched as Adam casually dropped his poem into the basket, as if it were just another math assignment. Evan knew that Adam had written his poem about playing basketball and Paul had written about his family's sailboat. Malik had written a poem about a bug, which he had recited to everyone on the playground that morning:

说他会没事的。” 一群孩子聚集在奥弗顿夫人的桌旁，听取兰斯顿健康状况的最新情况，并交上他们的情诗。 埃文注意到另一群人，大多是女孩，围着杰西的桌子。 他们想知道杰西是否完成了调查结果的统计，但杰西没有透露任何信息。 还没有。慢慢地，埃文从背包里拿出一张纸。 他希望站在老师桌子周围的孩子们能回到座位上。 他看着亚当随意地把他的诗扔进篮子里，好像这只是另一项数学作业。 埃文知道亚当的诗是关于打篮球的，保罗的诗是关于他家的帆船的。 马利克写了一首关于虫子的诗，并在那天早上背诵给操场上的每个人听：

I dug a bug from under the rug. The bug said hi and looked me in the eye. I hugged my bug. Bad idea! Bye-bye bug. Evan didn't think it really counted as a love poem, but it was pretty funny. He ambled over to Mrs. Overton's desk, his poem held low against his thigh. He watched and waited for the right moment, then slipped his poem, facedown, into the basket just before Nina and Ben put their poems on top of his. All morning, he'd gone back and forth: Should he hand in the poem about his grandmother or the one about the tepee in the woods on his grandma's farm? His mom said both were good, but it was the one about Grandma that made his heart beat fast and his mouth go dry. At the last minute, he'd decided to play it safe and hand in the one about the tepee.

我从地毯下挖出一只虫子。 虫子跟我打招呼，看着我的眼睛。 我抱着我的虫子。坏主意!再见。 埃文不认为这是一首真正的情诗，但它很有趣。 他慢悠悠地走到奥弗顿太太的书桌前，把诗低捧在大腿上。 他看着，等待合适的时机，然后在尼娜和本把他们的诗放在他的上面之前，把他的诗脸朝下塞进篮子里。 整个上午，他都在犹豫：是该交那首关于他祖母的诗，还是那首关于他祖母农场树林里的帐篷的诗？ 他妈妈说这两首歌都很好，但那首关于奶奶的歌让他心跳加速，口干舌燥。 在最后一刻，他决定稳妥起见，交了那篇关于帐篷的文章。

Several of the kids were telling Mrs. Overton about the second mysterious appearance of the candy hearts when Salley interrupted. "Tell us the truth, Mrs. O. Are you the one who left the candy hearts?" "I am not," said Mrs. Overton solemnly. "Yeah, but that's what you'd say if you did leave the hearts," said Ryan, and several kids agreed. "That may be true, but I didn't leave them. And I'm glad there weren't any waiting on your desks this morning." Evan was glad, too. He did not want to get another box of hearts with the kind of message you could find at Wal-Mart. He decided that if any more mysterious candy hearts appeared, he would throw his box in the trash without even looking at it. "Morning Meeting, everyone," said Mrs. Overton, corralling them all to the rug. "Today, I have two poems in honor of my poor sick cat,

几个孩子正在跟奥弗顿太太讲心形糖果第二次神秘出现时，莎莉打断了他们。 “跟我们说实话吧，欧太太。 是你留下心形糖果的吗？”“我没有，”奥弗顿太太一本正经地说。 “是啊，但如果你真的留下了心，你就会这么说。”瑞恩说，几个孩子同意了。 “这也许是真的，但我并没有离开他们。 我很高兴今天早上你们的桌子上没有人等我。” 埃文也很高兴。他不想再收到一盒心形的卡片，上面写着你可以在沃尔玛找到的那种信息。 他决定，如果再出现什么神秘的心形糖果，他就把盒子扔进垃圾桶，看都不看一眼。 “大家早会，”奥弗顿太太说着，把他们都叫到地毯上。 “今天，我有两首诗来纪念我那可怜的病猫，

who is now on the mend." "Two poems!" shouted Jessie. "Give me a break!" "I bet you're going to read us another poem by Langston Hughes," said David. "No, but I think you'll see why I chose this poem, instead," said Mrs. Overton. "It's called 'Fog.'" She turned the easel paper with a giant flourish of her arm, as if she were unveiling a statue in the center of town. Salley read the poem out loud, and Evan followed the words silently. FOG by Carl Sandburg The fog comes on little cat feet. It sits looking over harbor and city

现在正在康复中。”“两首诗！”杰西喊道。 “饶了我吧！”“我敢打赌你又要给我们读一首兰斯顿·休斯的诗，”大卫说。 “不，不过我想你会明白我为什么选了这首诗，”奥弗顿太太说。 “它叫‘雾’。’”她挥动着手臂转动画架上的纸，仿佛在镇中心为一座雕像揭幕。 莎莉大声朗读这首诗，埃文默默地跟着诗念。 雾降临在小猫的脚上。 它坐落在俯瞰港口和城市的地方

on silent haunches and then moves on. "It's a metaphor!" shouted Nina, pointing to the photo of Langston that said METAPHORS BE WITH YOU. Mrs. Overton had taught them how poets sometimes use one thing to mean something else. "Yes!" said Mrs. Overton. "What's the metaphor?" Almost half the class raised their hands. "The fog is a cat," answered Taffy. "That's just what fog is like," said Maddy. "It's like a cat, the way it creeps around." And Evan agreed. He had never thought about it before, but now he would always think of a cat when he saw fog creeping across his backyard. Jessie shook her head. "Fog is not like a cat. Not at all. Fog is vapor. It's drops of water in the air. A cat is an animal. It's a solid, and it's alive. The two are nothing alike."

默默地蹲着，然后继续前进。 “这是一个隐喻！”尼娜指着兰斯顿的照片喊道，照片上写着隐喻与你同在。 奥弗顿太太教过他们，诗人有时会用一件事来表示另一件事。 “是的！”奥弗顿太太说。“隐喻是什么？”几乎一半的学生都举手了。 “雾是一只猫，”太妃糖回答说。 “这就是雾的样子，”玛蒂说。 “就像一只猫，爬来爬去的样子。” 埃文同意了。他以前从来没有想过这个问题，但现在当他看到雾爬过他的后院时，他总是会想到一只猫。 杰西摇了摇头。“雾不像猫。 一点也不。雾是蒸汽。它是空气中的水滴。 猫是一种动物。它是固体，而且是有生命的。 这两个人一点也不像。”