flowing

1. 1
   adjective

   Moving, proceeding, or shaped in a smooth, graceful, or continuous way.

   The calligrapher admired the flowing lines of the old manuscript.

   Her speech had a flowing rhythm that held everyone's attention.

   Similarfluid, graceful, smooth, sweeping, elegant

   Oppositejerky, choppy, halting, stilted

   Note

   Its natural partners are dress, prose and hand, and the last means handwriting. Jane Shilling's 2013 review of The Golden Thread admires the "fine, flowing hand" of a Roman scribe writing on wax. A flowing dress echoes the verb's sense of hanging loose and waving. The adjective also grades with more and most, so one script can be more flowing than another.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of flow.

   Lava was flowing slowly down the side of the volcano.

   Traffic kept flowing across the bridge despite the storm.

   Note

   The -ing form does double work. With be it builds the progressive (the river is flowing). Without it, it heads a phrase that acts as a noun (flowing downhill is what water does). It carries every meaning of flow, including the tidal one, where flowing is the opposite of ebbing, and the sense of cloth or hair that hangs loose and waves.

3. 3
   adjective

   Inclined or able to move freely as a liquid does.

   The molten glass stayed flowing long enough for the artisan to shape it.

   Engineers prefer a flowing grout that settles into every gap on its own.

   Similarfluid, liquid, runny

   Oppositestiff, solid

4. 4
   noununcountable

   The continuous movement of a liquid or liquid-like mass from one place to another.

   The unceasing flowing of the tide reshaped the shoreline over decades.

   Geologists measured the slow flowing of the glacier across the valley.

   Similarmovement, motion

   Note

   A verbal noun already present in Middle English as flowyng, built simply from flow plus -ing. It behaves like a full noun: it takes the and an of-phrase (the flowing of the river) and even a plural, flowings. That sets it apart from the verb form used as a noun, which keeps verbal habits and takes an adverb instead: the river's flowing fast.

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