ThirstyFish

In social sciences, identity is defined as a person's conception or expression of their individuality or group affiliations. This is an Izmir man. He is a muslim. He is a vendor...

We are not who we think we are. How we define or express ourselves, or each other, are in actuality nothing but words. The word is not the person. The word is not the thing. What we call ourselves is not who we are. Images are even worse than words. So, who am I?

• Only Breath
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• Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu
• Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion
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• or cultural system. I am not from the East
• or the West, not out of the ocean or up
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• from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not
• composed of elements at all. I do not exist,
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• am not an entity in this world or in the next,
• did not descend from Adam and Eve or any
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• origin story. My place is placeless, a trace
• of the traceless. Neither body or soul.
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• I belong to the beloved, have seen the two
• worlds as one and that one call to and know,
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• first, last, outer, inner, only that
• breath breathing human being.
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• -- Rumi, from The Essential Rumi