The Water Poem by Ram Dass | Water, Emotions, and Meditation in Flow
- Laura Haipl
- Feb 12
- 4 min read
“The Water Poem” by Ram Dass is a song that feels like a small water meditation: a soundscape that moves emotions, opens inner spaces, and reminds you of the wisdom of the element of water. It weaves together gentle water sounds, meditative tones, and the presence of Ram Dass into a field in which you can once again feel soft, held, and connected. In this text, you will learn what “The Water Poem” is about, how water relates to emotions, and how you can use this song as a small everyday meditation.
Quick facts about the song
Song: “The Water Poem”
Artist: Ram Dass & AWARÉ (musicians’ collective)
Release: 2021 on the album And Now He Has Wings (Spirit Voyage Records)
Sound: meditative, instrumental music with water sounds, guitar, and ambient textures
Sometimes we encounter a piece of music and it feels like a gateway. A passage that leads us back to something primordial within us — something that is there, yet sometimes hidden and difficult to access. Ram Dass’ “The Water Poem” is exactly such a piece: through meditative, grounding, flowing sounds, it brings you back to softness, trust, and connection. The song is a gentle call that reminds us of the movement of life: of coming and going, of dissolving and re-emerging. It carries you back into your own flow through a soft current.
The Water Poem: A Water Meditation in Sound
“The Water Poem” is a recording by Ram Dass in collaboration with the musicians’ collective AWARÉ (2021). Rather than following a classical structure, the artists create a meditative field of sounds, water noises, and words that soothes through its simplicity and repetition. Ram Dass’ voice in the background does not feel like instruction, but like a supportive presence.
Between the pauses, you hear water: flowing, dripping, breathing. These sounds are not decorative — they carry the piece. They evoke springs, rain, the inner rushing within our own bodies. They remind us of what it feels like to soften. To move without forcing anything. They create a space in which we can listen to ourselves again. Personally, I experience a physical effect through this soundscape: the nervous system softens, breathing becomes deeper, and the inward gaze clearer.
Together with the soft guitar and ambient textures, a meditative current emerges that brings us back into a state of gentleness. Almost as if the song were saying: “You don’t have to hold on. You are allowed to flow.”
What the Element of Water Teaches Us About Change and Trust
Water knows no hurry. It moves at its own pace — unstoppable, continuous, yet never rushed.
It finds its way even through stone, without violence, without resistance, only through persistence and devotion. And while it changes, it always remains true to itself, without losing its essence.
From mist to drop.
From drop to stream.
From stream to river.
From river to sea.
Water reminds us of something fundamental: our own ability to change without losing ourselves. When we begin to move like water — soft, permeable, connected, unhurried — our relationship to life changes. Holding on becomes trust. Pressure becomes movement. Fear becomes flow.
Water invites us not to fight ourselves, but to allow ourselves to shift into the form that is right in each moment.
Water & Emotions: Why This Element Moves Us Deeply
Water is a symbol for everything that flows within us. Our emotions often move like water: sometimes calm and clear, sometimes turbulent, sometimes underground and barely visible. Ram Dass himself describes how closely water is intertwined with his emotional process, especially in moments of grief and profound inner transformation. After all, tears are water finding its way outward when words fail.
In many Indigenous cultures, water is considered a sacred being:
a carrier of memory and life
a force that connects and purifies
a messenger that speaks to us when we listen
This perspective opens another doorway: water is not just an element, but a relational partner. A mirror. When we observe its movement, we intuitively understand how emotions want to move:
flowing instead of being held
soft instead of fighting
permeable instead of armored
transforming instead of stagnating.
Working With Water as a Nature Therapist
As a systemic nature therapist, I have been working with people in and with nature for several years — by lakes, rivers, in forests, and during transitional phases of their lives. In retreats and 1:1 sessions, I repeatedly witness how water as an element opens access to emotions: when we sit by the shore, listen to a stream, or enter inner movement through a song like “The Water Poem.” These moments are often quiet and deeply profound — because water reminds us that transformation may happen gently, step by step, and in our own time.
The Water Poem as a Small Everyday Meditation: Try It Out
Take a few minutes. Find a quiet place — by a river, by an open window, or under the warm water of a shower. Play The Water Poem, breathe softly, and observe how your breath connects with the sound, how it is breathed and carried by it. Let your thoughts drift like leaves on water. You don’t have to do anything. Just listen. Just flow.
In my retreats, we use such sound moments to accompany transitions — away from thinking and into sensing. Water helps us remember our own inner current. Again and again, I experience how water almost always opens a doorway: sitting by a lake, listening to a stream, immersing oneself in the depth of waves.
The movement of water reminds us that transformation does not always have to be loud or visible. Sometimes it happens in silent listening, in gentle yielding, in trust in the elemental.
Bringing It Into Practice: Retreats & Nature-Based Guidance
If you long for such spaces — for days in nature in which you return to your flow — you can find information about upcoming retreats and individual nature-based guidance on my website:
There are moments when life does not ask us to act, but to flow. “The Water Poem” reminds us of the movement of water and of our own current. Perhaps you can already feel it now — where the water flows within you.
Here you will find more inspiring texts and visuals — by poets, musicians, word artists, and other inspiring people.
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