Bayazid is in seclusion.
These words leave his mouth.

Attar tells it:
When he comes to himself, his disciples tell him.
"If I say it again, cut me to pieces," he says,
and gives each of them a knife.

The words come again.
The knives fall empty, as if striking water.

It is a legend.
But it leaves a question:
When the self falls silent,
whose is the tongue?