weeping

Pluralweepings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of weep.

   The mourners stood weeping at the graveside.

   Weeping softly, she folded the last of his letters away.

   Note

   A single -ing form doing two jobs. After be it builds the progressive (they were weeping), and on its own it can name the activity (weeping won't bring him back). It carries every meaning of weep, not only tears: a wound can be weeping, moisture can come weeping out in drops, and branches can hang weeping. The past forms are irregular, with wept serving as both past tense and past participle.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act of shedding tears, especially as an expression of grief or strong emotion.

   The funeral was filled with the quiet weeping of friends and family.

   His weeping finally subsided as the first light came through the window.

   Similarcrying, sobbing, tears

   Oppositelaughter

   Note

   As a noun it accepts an article, an adjective or a plural. The plural weepings counts separate bouts of crying and often carries impatience, as in constant weepings that kept a household awake. Peter McAra's A World Apart (2013) pairs it with handwringings, and together they make grief sound like a tiresome habit. For ordinary grief the uncountable weeping is the natural choice.

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