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My flight leaves India at four in the morning, which is typical of how India works. I decide not to go to sleep at all that night, but to spend the whole evening in one of the meditation caves, in prayer. I'm not a late-night person by nature, but something in me wants to stay awake for these last hours at the Ashram. There are many things in my life I've stayed up all night to do—to make love, to argue with someone, to drive long distances, to dance, to cry, to worry (and sometimes all those things, in fact, in the course of one night)—but I've never sacrificed sleep for a night of exclusive prayer. Why not now?
我的班機將在清晨四時離開印度，這是典型的印度運作方式。我決定當天晚上不睡覺，整晚待在禪坐洞祈禱。我生性不是夜貓子，卻想在道場的最后幾個鐘頭保持清醒。我這輩子曾經熬夜做過許多事——做愛、與某人爭執、開長途車、跳舞、哭泣、擔憂（事實上，這些事有時在同一個晚上發生）——但我從未犧牲睡眠特地祈禱一個夜晚。現在何不這么做？
I pack my bag and leave it by the temple gate, so I can be ready to grab it and go when the taxi arrives before dawn. And then I walk up the hill, I go into the meditation cave and I sit. I'm alone in there, but I sit where I can see the big photograph of Swamiji, my Guru's master, the founder of this Ashram, the long-gone lion who is somehow still here. I close my eyes and let the mantra come. I climb down that ladder into my own hub of stillness. When I get there, I can feel the world halt, the way I always wanted it to halt when I was nine years old and pan-icking about the relentlessness of time. In my heart, the clock stops and the calendar pages quit flying off the wall. I sit in silent wonder at all I understand. I am not actively praying. I have become a prayer.
我把袋子留在寺院大門邊，讓凌晨時分計程車到來時，可以拿了就走。而后我走上山丘，進禪坐洞，坐下來。我獨自一人，坐在看得見道場創辦人、導師之師、早已作古卻仍在此地的思瓦米吉的大幅照片的地方。我閉上眼睛，讓咒語來臨。我爬下階梯，進入自己的寂靜中心。抵達之時，我感覺世界停頓下來，就像我九歲的時候，對時間的無情感到恐慌而老是希望時間停下來一般。我坐著，在寂靜中，思索一切我已了解的事物。在我心中，時鐘停止，墻上的月歷不再從墻上飛走。我并未主動禱告，我已“成為”禱告。
I can sit here all night. In fact, I do.
我可以一整晚坐在這里。事實上，我這么做了。
I don't know what alerts me when it's time to go meet my taxi, but after several hours of stillness, something gives me a nudge, and when I look at my watch it's exactly time to go. I have to fly to Indonesia now. How funny and strange. So I stand up and bow before the photograph of Swamiji—the bossy, the marvelous, the fiery. And then I slide a piece of paper under the carpet, right below his image. On the paper are the two poems I wrote during my four months in India. These are the first real poems I've ever written. A plumber from New Zealand encouraged me to try poetry for once—that's why it happened. One of these poems I wrote after having been here only a month. The other, I just wrote this morning.
不知什么東西提醒我該去搭計程車，在數小時的寂靜后輕碰我一下，看表時，正好是該走的時刻。我現在必須前往印尼。多么有趣而奇異。于是我站起身來，在思瓦米吉——專橫、神奇、激昂的明師——的相片面前鞠躬。而后我把一張紙塞入他相片下方的地毯底下。紙上是我在印度四個月間寫的兩首詩。是我頭一次創作的真正的詩。新西蘭的水管工鼓勵我嘗試寫詩——此即源由所在。其中一首寫于待在道場一個月之后，另一首則寫于今晨。
In the space between the two poems, I have found acres of grace. Eat, Pray, Love
在兩首詩之間的空間，我找到無限寬廣的恩典。
