Rehab

Breathe.
Deeply.

Breathe
as if it is your last.

Breathe.
No matter that you are dying
slowly,
that life is your battleground.
None of that is important,
only breath.

You cannot stop the end.
You can only slow it down,
change the timing,
change the joy,
savor everything.
Even breath.

Breathe deeply.
Feel the air fill your lungs,
every last chamber of them
rich with life giving air,
each breath a promise
of the next.

Breath.
Take nothing for granted.
Not even this,
for everything can be taken away
unless you do the work,
unless you claim each breath
consciously,
and revel in how simple life becomes
when breath is mindful
and all other things fall aside.

Breathe
again
and again
and yet again.

About this poem

My Dad has serious breathing problems. I’ve had a round of them myself the past couple of months. Nothing is more basic. Breathing rehab makes a difference, if you do it.

Breathing is a part of my daily meditation. And from time to time I lapse, and have to reclaim it. Rehab.

We all stray from our best selves from time to time. And we need sort of a rehab to reclaim it.

From all those thoughts, this poem.

Tom