《美食祈祷和恋爱》Chapter 37 (80):唱起赞歌

This is the hymn I call "The Amazing Grace of Sanskrit," filled with devotional longing. It is the one devotional song I have memorized, not so much from effort as from love. I begin to sing the familiar words in Sanskrit, from the simple introduction about the sacred teachings of Yoga to the rising tones of worship ("I adore the cause of the universe . . . I adore the one whose eyes are the sun, the moon and fire . . . you are everything to me, O god of gods . . .") to the last gemlike summation of all faith ("This is perfect, that is perfect, if you take the perfect from the perfect, the perfect remains"). 这首赞歌被我称为“奇异恩典梵语版”，充满虔诚的渴望。我熟记这首奉献赞歌，与其说费心熟记，不如说打从心底去爱。我开始用梵语唱出熟悉的歌词，从瑜伽神圣教诲的简单介绍，到崇奉朝拜的扬调（“我敬拜宇宙之缘起……我敬拜眼是日、月和火的神……你是我的一切，喔万神之神……”），到玉石般的信仰总结（“这很完美，那很完美，你若从完美取出完美，完美依然留存”）。

The women finish singing. They bow in silence, then move out a side door across a dark courtyard and into a smaller temple, barely lit by one oil lamp and perfumed with incense. I follow them. The room is filled with devotees—Indian and Western—wrapped in woolen shawls against the predawn cold. Everyone is seated in meditation, roosted there, you might say, and I slip in beside them, the new bird in the flock, completely unnoticed. I sit crosslegged, place my hands on my knees, close my eyes. 女人们停止咏唱。她们静静地鞠躬，而后从侧门穿过黑暗的庭院，走进小寺庙，庙里只点一盏煤油灯，薰香弥漫。我跟在她们后头。屋里都是虔诚的信徒——印度人和西方人——裹着羊毛披巾，抵御黎明前的寒冷。人人都在打坐，可以说是窝在那里，而我则溜进他们旁边，鸡群当中的新来者，根本无人注意。我盘腿坐着，双手搁在膝上，闭上眼睛。

I have not meditated in four months. I have not even thought about meditating in four months. I sit there. My breath quiets. I say the mantra to myself once very slowly and deliberately, syllable by syllable. 我已有四个月的时间未曾打坐。这四个月内我想都没想过打坐的事。我坐在那儿。呼吸静下来。我对自己念一次咒语，缓慢从容，逐字逐句。

Om. Na. Mah. Shi. Va. Ya. Om Namah Shivaya. 唵——南——嘛— —湿— —婆 ——耶。唵南嘛湿婆耶。

I honor the divinity that resides within me. 我敬重存在内心的神灵。

Then I repeat it again. Again. And again. It's not so much that I'm meditating as unpacking the mantra carefully, the way you would unpack your grandmother's best china if it had been stored in a box for a long time, unused. I don't know if I fall asleep or if I drop into some kind of spell or even how much time passes. But when the sun finally comes up that morning in India and everyone opens their eyes and looks around, Italy feels ten thousand miles away from me now, and it is as if I have been here in this flock , Pray, Love 而后我又念了一遍。一遍。又一遍。与其说我在打坐，不如说我在小心翼翼地解开咒语，有如从盒子里解开祖母收藏多年、未曾使用的最好的瓷器。我不知道自己是否睡着，或者陷入某种魔咒当中，也不知经过多久时间。可是当天清晨，太阳在印度升起，人人睁开眼睛、环顾四周之时，感觉意大利已距离我有千万里之遥，仿佛我一直跟这群人待在这里。