<excerpts from tate's "breathing"> 2006-08-16.2:28 p.m. excerpts from "Breathing" James Tate At the window, I see nothing. Correction: I see two girls playing tennis, they have no voices, only the muted thump of the ball kissing the racket, the sound of a snowball hitting a snowman, the sound of a snowman's head rolling into a river, a snowman with an alarm clock for a heart deep inside him. Listen: someone is breathing. Someone has a problem breathing. Someone is blowing smoke through a straw. Someone has stopped breathing. Amazing. Someone broke his wrist this morning, broke it into powder. He did it intentionally. He had an accident while breathing. He was exhaling when his wrist broke. Actually it's a woman breathing. She's not even thinking about it. She's thinking about something else. back /& forth /& frosting names are often sad