Om Tare Tam Svaha

Excerpted from Sounds True’s Songs of Tara:

Tara is venerated by Hindus and Buddhists alike, and seems to predate Tantric Buddhism in India as a Hindu deity. Scholars note many links between her and ancient forms of the goddess Durga. Her Indian name, Tara, means “Star,” but it is also a form of the word that means “to ferry" or “to carry across,” which relates more closely to the literal meaning of her Tibetan name. […] Tara’s “seed syllable,” a single, untranslatable sound that expresses her entire essence, is Tam. The mantra Om Tare Tam Svaha (or, in Tibetan pronunciation, Soha) is thus know as her “heart song” and is sometimes associated with the more wrathful form of Red Tara, whose practice brings wisdom and awareness of our ultimate nature. […] A Tibetan nun [Jetsun Ani Rinpoche] with a voice straight from primordial space pierces our hearts with the mantra Om Tare Tam Svaha.