Rumi seeks the Tawhid of Siratal Mustaqim in the Silence

Only Breath

Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu,

Buddhist, sufi or zen. Not any religion

or cultural system. I am not from the East
or the West, not out of the ocean or up

from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
composed of elements at all. I do not exist,

am not an entity in this world or the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any

origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
of the traceless. Neither body or soul.

I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
worlds as one and that one call to and know,

first, last, outer, inner, only that
breath breathing human being.

There is a way between voice and presence

where information flows.

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In disciplined silence it opens.

With wandering talk it closes.

The Essential Rumi, translations by Coleman Barks (p. 32. 1995).