pant
/pant
/- It was a stand off now, the two circling each other as they panted, short of breath, and sweat gleamed on their foreheads, dirt smeared across their faces.
- We paused by a telephone pole, leaned against a garden wall, and panted in short urgent breaths.
- We reached my house, panting and out of breath but excited nonetheless.
Synonyms
- "I am late," she pants with pouty jowls.
- "I'm suffocating," she pants.
- America is such an enlightened and benign hegemon, they argue, that most states will pant for US leadership.
- The complete domination that they pant for is so close and yet still not complete.
- Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them.
Synonyms
- His chest panting, the big Guaranzen saw Hark rush him once more.
- Her chest was panting faster by the second as he looked at her with those passionate blue eyes.
- Breath coming in short pants, he halted at the base of the tower.
- His breath came in short pants, as if he really had been running.
- He was covered in cold sweat and his breath came in short pants.
Synonyms
Origin
Middle English: related to Old French pantaisier 'be agitated, gasp', based on Greek phantasioun 'cause to imagine', from phantasia (see fantasy).
fantastic from Late Middle English:
A word originally meaning ‘existing only in the imagination, unreal’ that comes from Greek phantastikos ‘vision’. Fantasy (Late Middle English) is of similar origin, as is fancy (Late Middle English), a contracted version of fantasy. The modern use of fantastic to mean ‘wonderful, excellent’ dates from the 1930s. The playful phrase trip the light fantastic, meaning ‘to dance’, goes back to John Milton's 1645 poem L'Allegro: ‘Come, and trip it as you go / On the light fantastic toe.’ Pant (Middle English) ‘to breath spasmodically’ goes back to the root verb of fantastic, phainon ‘to show’, via Old French pantaisier ‘be agitated, gasp’; as do phantom (Middle English) from phantasma ‘mere appearance’ and phenomenon (late 16th century) which meant ‘things appearing to view’ in the original Greek.