Mr. Altig’s Overview of the Wonderful Dharma of the Lotus Sutra

A Blues Folk Ballad

Three voices, one family breaking apart. A mysterious neighbor with an open door and endless tea. A blues-folk story about the three poisons we carry—greed, anger, and numbness—and the unexpected way we learn to set them down. Told through the eyes of a daughter scrolling her pain away, a son burning with rage, and a mother who’s forgotten how to feel. Sometimes the person who saves you is just a mirror showing you who you already are.

Inspired by Buddhist parables and modern urban loneliness. Pour yourself some tea and listen.

Lyrics: 

Verse 1 

There’s a rooster in my chest, won’t let me rest, 

Peckin’ all night long, sayin’ more, more, more 

There’s a snake wrapped ’round my son’s young heart, 

Spittin’ poison through a bedroom door 

And mama’s gone to somewhere we can’t reach, 

Like a pig with its eyes rolled back 

We’re three people eatin’ dinner in silence, 

Each one walkin’ a different track

Chorus 

But there’s a light on in apartment 4B, 

Door standin’ open wide 

Kettle singin’ on the stove, 

And an old woman waitin’ inside 

She says, “Child, come in from the rain, 

Let me show you somethin’ true— 

The one you’re lookin’ for to save you, 

Baby, that’s already you”

Verse 2 

She was ancient as the hills, that Mrs. Chen, 

With a face like a walnut tree 

And she had this way of knowin’ 

What was eatin’ you and me 

She’d say, “Girl, you tryin’ to hold water in your fists? 

Boy, those coals are burnin’ your hands. 

Mama, you can’t hide from your own heartbeat— 

That ain’t livin’, that’s just sand”

Chorus 

There’s a light on in apartment 4B, 

Tea cups on the table set She says, 

“Don’t pray to me, just breathe with me, 

Imagine who you haven’t met— 

The you that don’t need what you ain’t got, 

The you that don’t need to fight, 

The you that ain’t afraid to feel— 

Baby, that’s your birthright”

Verse 3 

She told my girl, “When the wantin’ starts to claw, 

Picture someone satisfied 

Not ’cause they got everything, 

But ’cause they got nothin’ to hide” 

She told my boy, “When the hatred starts to burn, 

Try to see through their eyes— 

Hurt people hurt people, son, 

That ain’t judgment, that’s just life”

Bridge 

And she sat with me, Lord, she sat with me, 

While I cried for the first time in a year 

She said, “You think you’re separate from your pain, 

But that’s the lie, my dear 

When you numb yourself from sufferin’, 

You numb yourself from joy— 

The door’s been locked from the inside, 

And you’re the one with the key, boy”

Verse 4 

Six months passed like morning rain, 

Somethin’ shifted in our home 

My daughter put her phone down smilin’, 

My son stopped throwin’ stones 

I picked up a paintbrush, my hands rememberin’, 

What it felt like to be whole 

We’d sit in 4B every Tuesday, 

Drinkin’ tea and feedin’ our souls

Chorus 

Yeah, there’s a light on in apartment 4B, 

We’re laughin’ like we’re free 

She says, “See? The jewel was in the lotus, 

You just couldn’t see 

The mud don’t hide your nature, 

It’s where the lotus grows— 

Your greed, your rage, your blindness, 

That’s the only path home”

Verse 5 

Then one Tuesday the door was empty, 

Just a kettle and a note It said, 

“The door was always yours, my loves, 

I just held it while you learned to float 

Keep it open, keep it brewin’, 

Someone else will need a light— 

I wasn’t up there savin’ you, 

I was just your mirror shinin’ bright”

Breakdown/Spoken Word over soft guitar 

And we understood then, 

Sittin’ in that empty room, 

She was never someone else— 

She was just what we could become 

When we stopped pretendin’ 

We were separate from the pain, 

Separate from each other, 

Separate from the rain

Final Verse 

Now we live in 4B, keepin’ that door wide, 

Kettle singin’ all day long 

When the angry boy walks past, my son says, “Hey, I know that song” 

When the woman with the vacant eyes comes by, 

I hand her a brush and say, “Paint” 

When the girl can’t stop scrollin’, my daughter smiles, 

Says, “I used to be you, ain’t that quaint?”

Final Chorus 

Now there’s a light on in apartment 4B, 

And it ain’t goin’ out tonight 

We ain’t waitin’ for some savior, 

We became the light 

She said, “The Bodhisattva ain’t someone else, 

It’s who you are when you can see— 

We’re all just water from the same well, 

All just waves on the same sea”

Outro (slow, repeated) 

The rooster’s gettin’ quiet now… (the rooster’s gettin’ quiet) 

The snake is lettin’ go… (the snake is lettin’ go) 

The pig has opened up its eyes… (opened up its eyes) 

And Lord, now we know… (Lord, now we know)

The door was always open, 

The tea was always brewin’, 

The jewel was in the lotus, 

And the lotus… was you.

(Harmonica fades out)