Monday, November 15, 2021

Spiritual Experience by Cristina Peri Rossi



Spiritual Experience
By Cristina Peri Rossi
Translated by Diana Decker

She told me that she was looking for a spiritual experience
a very serious thing
in the world there were some two thousand religions
without taking into account the sects

but she wanted something else
“I want a spiritual experience”
she told me

I believe that I hadn’t had that
I had had war experiences
and revolutions sensorial experiences
musical experiences work experiences

unless we consider that being in ecstasy in front of a Turner or
Caspar David Friedrich shipwreck

was a spiritual experience

unless reading J.G. Ballard
or Vallejo’s poems
were spiritual experiences

I had also had several experiences with sunsets
splendid in the port of Santa Maria
the Southern light, the brilliant light of the South,

but she told me that it wasn’t about any of that
it wasn’t about the sadness that Chopin’s études caused me
or Satie’s Gymnopédies which now are in the cell phones

she told me it was something else

Then she went to India
and I didn’t follow her
because I have seen much misery in this world

without reaching the necessary degree of spirituality

She spent some two years in India
and when she returned she was slimmer
How are you doing? she asked me
The usual, I answered

I write a bit read some play mahjong in the internet

sometimes a car hits me

but in general, I continue without having spiritual experiences
so I asked her how had it been in India
and she answered that well
very well
she had had a spiritual experience

-she said-

that turned all orgasms
frivolous and ridiculous

I thought that for that it wasn’t necessary to go to India
it was enough having reached menopause.




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