“This book, a collection of the songs of realization of the Shangpa masters, constitutes a major source of the lineage’s spiritual nourishment. Kalu Rinpoche told those of us in retreat under his guidance to read this collection if we wanted to read something apart from the texts of our program’s meditations. During retreat or after, in Western meditation centers or in Asian monasteries, we sometimes gather to sing these songs in unison. They guide us, nourish us, remind us, and take on new meaning as the years go by. We return to them, as to trusted friends, for the support and encouragement we need to keep on giving our best to this precious life. We have always enjoyed them in Tibetan; they appear here in translation for the first time.

Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Taye compiled these songs in the nineteenth century, mainly from the autobiographies of the lineage’s masters. What is clear from the first song is that this collection mainly gathers songs of spiritual teachings. Western readers have fallen in love, just as Tibetans do, with the songs of Milarepa and of Shabkar. Those realized masters were wandering yogis, who sometimes sang of profound teachings they’d received and practiced but often imparted down-to-earth advice to the good people they met. They would also sing of their surroundings, for these men often lived in the wilds, and their songs allow us to share their awe in the presence of enlightenment, reflected in the spiritual master who appears in symbolic form in nature, in all appearances. As Kalu Rinpoche sings:

Thus the whole universe—visible, audible, and
conceptual—
Pointing out to myself and others the direct
apprehension of the underlying reality,
Is nothing but the gesture of my lama.”

—Ngawang Zangpo, from the Preface to Timeless Rapture, compiled by Jamgön Kongtrul