La noche espiritual

In its bold, dark, and powerful beauty, this text, this exquisite prose poem, says the exact opposite of what it does. The day after her author's first meeting with the famous writer Jean Genet -whom she revered- he declared: "I don't want to see her again, she contradicts me again and again. Besides, Lydie is a woman, and I hate women". Devastated by this unexpected banishment of her, she decided to write a poem so beautiful that it would force him to return to her. She also challenged the teacher by playing her own game, with the same rules. Genet, abandoned child, thief, deserter from the army, homosexual who practiced prostitution... he always lived on the margins and soon discovered how to deal with all these categories of exclusion: accept to their last consequences each of the insults he received, adorn yourself with them with mystical fervor, receive them as a decoration. To assert oneself in ignominy, to strain, to distill infamy to such an extent that it sparkled, until, thanks to her verb, she gave off the most resplendent brilliance and became glorious. In his literary universe, criminals are free, unique, epic. In this universe, of course, women are banned: their destiny is devoid of all heroism, their destiny is none other than darkness. Forgotten and denied in her books, in this poem by Lydie Dattas they are reborn, however, to take revenge. Decked out with her gloom, she too will accept the insult -to be a woman- and will sublimate her words until the darkness of female indignity flashes a light that manages to blind the poet. If Genet didn't believe her capable of reaching him, he was wrong.