Implicit In Every Breath Poem by Grant House

Before you were born
You were everywhere and everything
Soon enough
You will be everywhere and everything again.
So where are you now? Who are you now?

Now, you might say, I am here and I am me.
Or so it seems.

Who, you might ask, are all these other people?
Where am I, you might wonder, and, How did this fairly large universe get here?

I wonder what exactly happens at our birth
That initiates this sense of separation?
Could it be that all this is an illusion?
At the same time that you occupy this place and this body
Could it be that you are still everywhere and everything?

Where you have been
Who you are
Where you are going
These might be the very same place.

Who you were
Who you are
Who you will be
These might be the very same being.

Who we were
Who we are
Who we will be
Well, these, too, might be the same.

If I ask you who you are
Your answer would likely begin with these two words
I am.

Implicit in every breath
Are these two words
I am

This declaration
This assertion
This existential moment of being
This audacious claim

Breathing out
I
Breathing in
Am

Each breath
Each heartbeat
Each brain wave
Each moment of awareness
Each time our eyes meet
Our hands touch
Whenever and wherever you are
When you enter that realm of presence
Whenever and wherever I am
When I enter that realm of presence
Even if separated by thousands of miles
And great epochs of time
We meet
In the eternal
Moment of creation
I am

I am
The way
The truth
The light

I am
In the beginning
Was the word

I am
Om
Sat Nam
Wahe Guru

Who is saying this I am?

Might this be another way of asking
What is the name of God?

When the one who says I am
Recognizes who you are
We both say
Namaste

I bow to the divine in you

The
I am
Me
Bows
To the
I am
You

This breath
And this one
And this one
Without words
Say

I Am