The Friend (Metta)

Lyrics

[Intro]

[Verse 1]
In the Jetavana grove, under the banyan tree,
Gautama sat, c. 500 BCE, with his brass alms bowl,
dented from paths between Savatthi and Rajagaha.
You, my old friend, this bowl of beaten metal,
holding rice gruel at dawn, 80 degrees Fahrenheit,
scent of sandalwood clinging like a memory.

[Chorus]
May all beings be happy, you whisper to me,
in the quiet of mirror neurons firing,
that soft circuit in the prefrontal cortex,
linking my heart to the stranger's sigh.
Metta flows like dopamine in the ventral stream,
from your curved edge to the world's frayed ends.

[Verse 2]
I hold you now, in this tender light,
remembering the monk's chant at sunrise,
'may you be free from enmity,' he said,
to snakes and insects in the damp earth.
Your brass surface, cool against my palm,
reflects the neural web of loving-kindness,
where empathy binds us, invisible threads.

[Bridge]

In the rainy season, crushed lotus leaves,
Gautama's words from the Metta Sutta, 5th century BCE,
no hatred ceases but by love, eternal rule.
You, bowl, you've seen the gaps—unnamed disciples,
their unspoken transformations in the grove.

[Verse 3]
Address you as the friend who softens edges,
in the basal ganglia's gentle loop,
where kindness rewires the default mode.
From Savatthi mornings to my quiet room,
your dented form holds a thousand sighs,
each one a spark in the brain's deep awe.

[Outro]

May all beings be happy, my friend,
in this improbable glow of connection.