Om Trayambakam Yajamahe Sugandhim Pushtivardhanam
Urvarukamiva Bandhanan Mrtyor Mukshiyamamritat.
-the Maha Mrtyunjaya, or Great Death conquering, mantra of the Rig Veda

Roughly translated,
We worship the three eyed lord who nourishes and nurtures all beings. May he liberate us from the bonds of death into immortality just as the cucumber is freed from the vine.

This is one of the most core mantras in Hinduism, chanted daily as part of standard prayers, and by those affected by death and I'll health. It has an incredibly soothing rhythm, and is honestly just fun to chant for long periods of time, especially if you're a former raver

The mantra speaks of the three eyed lord, who we associate with Shiva in his primordial form Rudra, the wild, howling one. The third eye is almost a cliché at this point, but it represents sight beyond the physical realm, into our interior space, piercing the illusion of life

Why Shiva? Because he is the destroyer. But not a chaos godzilla destruction. The things Shiva destroys are our illusions and falsehoods and ego. His third eye opens and incinerates our attachments to this reality.

And what is the fragrant third eyed one doing? Nourishing the universe. Feeding it, growing it, giving it life. But wait, we just said Shiva destroys? Hinduism is big on cycles. Fire burns the built up underbrush to allow the new growth to flourish. Ash fertilizes, after all.

So the three eyed one, the celestial gardener who is perfumed with the fragrance of life's flourishes, is nourishing and raising us. But this life is holding us down from achieving perfection, through our attachments and desires and inability to see past our own base emotions

But eventually even we grow and ripen and mature, and when that point comes, we hope that we are plucked off this tendril we are tied to, before we just shrivel and die on the vine

So this prayer is asking the lord to look after us, when the celestial gardener feels that we have reached our peak of perfection, and free us from the cycles of life and death and into immortality. In God's salad bowl or something. Look, the metaphor kinda falls off, OK.

But more importantly, this is a chant that brings peace to dying, as well as those being left behind. This is a chant whose rhythm is soothing and even, like a calm heartbeat. And when you are processing grief, you get a metronome to give you a chill beat to calm down.

It's like listening to really wild jazz, prog, or dubstep. An utterly insane whirl of sounds and emotions and vibrations chaotically bouncing like atoms in boiling water, and a solid and implacable beat to tie it all together.

When beginning a practice of chanting, this is a good one to learn and master. It is a comfort and a constant, and in this era, that is something we could all use. Hari Om!