suspire
Americanverb (used without object)
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to sigh.
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to breathe.
verb (used with object)
verb
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to sigh or utter with a sigh; yearn
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(intr) to breathe; respire
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of suspire
1400–50; late Middle English < Latin suspīrāre, equivalent to su- su- + spīrāre to breathe
Explanation
When you suspire, you breathe deeply or sigh. You might suspire melodramatically as you listen to your best friend complain about her allowance for the thousandth time. The verb suspire is considered obsolete today—you'll probably only encounter it when you're reading poetry. In Robert Frost's poem "Sitting by a Bush in Broad Sunlight," he wrote: "And from that one intake of fire / All creatures still warmly suspire." Not only is it a literary way to say "breathe," but it also rhymes nicely with "fire." The Latin root is spirare, "to breathe."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
We only live, only suspire Consumed by either fire or fire.
From Time Magazine Archive
By his gates of breath There lies a downy feather which stirs not: Did he suspire, that light and weightless down Perforce must move.
From King Henry IV, Part 2 by Shakespeare, William
The elements we feel and see shift and drift and suspire And we therein behind the screen, with glimmering brains that tire.
From Perpetual Light : a memorial by Benét, William Rose
Marlow's tale was a powerful one: I could hear Mrs. Marlow suspire faintly, ever so faintly—the troubled, small, soft sigh of a brave woman indefinably stricken.
From Plum Pudding Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned by Morley, Christopher
"But times are bad!" he would suspire in moments of depression.
From The Valley of the Kings by Pickthall, Marmaduke William
The expression became a war-cry, and the world escaped from the baleful sceptre under whose shadow it had too long suspired.
From The Golden Censer The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future by McGovern, John
He suspired exhaustively in the still, strong heat, and took possession of the scene with commanding, intolerant eyes.
From Those Who Smiled And Eleven Other Stories by Gibbon, Perceval
The scene about me suspired like the brilliant and deadly scales of a poisonous reptile.
From Children of the Market Place by Masters, Edgar Lee
But at four o'clock there was a rim, A circled edge of rainbow color Which suspired, widened and narrowed under your gaze: It was the phantasy of straining eyes, Or land—and it was land.
From Songs and Satires by Masters, Edgar Lee
The Boy is a white flame suspiring in prayer.
From Men, Women and Ghosts by Lowell, Amy
The sad melody wailed upwards as though it were the voice of the wind playing about his grave, every note breathing pathos or suspiring in tremulous anguish.
From Dead Man's Rock by Quiller-Couch, Arthur Thomas, Sir
You've been suspiring and then you've wiped your forehead with your dirty hand, the way you say I mustn't.
From The Brimming Cup by Fisher, Dorothy Canfield
As he jumped, the girl, Alexa, started, and a cry escaped her parted lips; it was a sigh rather than an exclamation, the voice of a crushed flower suspiring its last vital breath.
From The Doomsman by Sutphen, Van Tassel
Only intermittently did the atmosphere so breathe—for breathing it was, the suspiring of the languid, Hawaiian afternoon.
From On the Makaloa Mat by London, Jack
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
