Shadows Drink the River

[Intro – whispered / layered voices, echoes overlapping] Want is a vine, wrap tight ‘round the spine, Fire in the mind that the rain can’t find, Name in the mirror, think the name is you, But the river don’t stop when the face is new. ⸻ [Hook – mantra-like] Shadows drink the river, Hunger drinks the flame, Lose the self you carry, You can’t be owned by pain. Shadows drink the river, Thirst can’t drink it dry, Let the current take your story, See the world with someone else’s eyes. ⸻ [Verse 1 – The Ancient Voices] Buddha said thirst is the root of the chain, Links lock tight ‘til you see through the frame, Gita said fire never full, never fed, Wisdom goes blind where the wanting’s led, Tao says “empty and you’ll echo the sky,” Ocean holds rain ‘cause it’s low, not high, Stoic in Rome says “Want what is here,” Build a citadel inside, make your kingdom clear. ⸻ [Verse 2 – The Sacred Mirrors] Proverbs cut deep like a blade of light, Pride trips kings in the dead of night, Ecclesiastes: all is wind, all is dust, Jesus says “treasure where moth won’t touch,” Rumi spins wild ‘til the self unwinds, Moth meets flame, leave the ash behind, Upanishad whispers, “You’re the sea, not the wave,” When the names fall off, there’s no one to save. ⸻ [Hook – mantra-like, beat thicker] Shadows drink the river, Hunger drinks the flame, Lose the self you carry, You can’t be owned by pain. ⸻ [Verse 3 – The Modern Lens] Science says dopamine pulls the string, Want ain’t joy but the wanting thing, Mind’s default hum runs the old loop tape, Self-talk storms in a skull-shaped cape, Culture builds towers from the bones of “more,” Status is a mask that the masks adore, But the brain learns quiet in a breath’s wide span, Freedom’s in the space ‘fore the act begins. ⸻ [Bridge – spoken, over sparse beat] Every teacher, every street, From the cedar scroll to the concrete beat, Said the same thing in a thousand tongues: The hands that clutch are the hands that burn. ⸻ [Verse 4 – Synthesis] River don’t care what the reed called home, Mountain don’t keep what the wind has blown, Each path says: see it, then loosen the thread, Carry the world, but not on your head, It’s the same soft law in the sage and the street, Same bare truth in the heat and the sleet: The less you need, the more you can give, The less you’re “mine,” the more you live. ⸻ [Final Hook – layered voices, fading instruments] Shadows drink the river, Hunger drinks the flame, Lose the self you carry, You can’t be owned by pain. Shadows drink the river… [river sound swells, everything fades]