Tim Taylor

Breath

It is almost nothing:

invisible, except when frigid air

or cold, smooth glass

transforms its moisture into mist;

its sound too faint to hear

unless the body needs more of it

than the lungs can claim.

It has no taste, no smell:

whatever chance aromas it may wear

are not its own. We feel 

only a passing breeze across the lips,

a rhythmic swelling 

and contraction of the chest,

so gentle, so familiar we forget

that it is happening. How strange 

that our entire life depends

upon a thing so insubstantial

that we might suppose 

it wasn’t there at all.