breasts

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of breast.

   The robins puffed out their red breasts in the cold.

   Surgeons studied the scans of both breasts before planning the operation.

   Note

   One spelling serves the whole family of noun meanings, not just the anatomical pair. A butcher's counter sells chicken breasts, a flock of robins shows puffed-out breasts, and when several people feel the same thing, it stirs in their breasts. The figurative heart takes the plural once it has more than one owner. The same letters also spell the verb meaning "faces head-on", so only the sentence around the word tells you which is meant.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of breast.

   The swimmer breasts the rolling waves with steady, even strokes.

   The lead runner breasts the finish line as the crowd erupts.

   Note

   A transitive verb that takes its object directly, with no preposition: a swimmer breasts the waves, a walker breasts the hill. The image is a chest pressed against whatever comes, and it often turns figurative, so that a person breasts a crisis the way a swimmer breasts a current. Its other common job is reaching a crest: to breast a rise is to top it. Write it without "against" or "through". The verb already carries that meaning.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2