See drift away on Wiktionary
{
"forms": [
{
"form": "drifts away",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "drifting away",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "drifted away",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "drifted away",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "drift away (third-person singular simple present drifts away, present participle drifting away, simple past and past participle drifted away)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"_dis": "68 32",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "78 22",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English phrasal verbs formed with \"away\"",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "78 22",
"kind": "other",
"name": "Pages with 1 entry",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "84 16",
"kind": "other",
"name": "Pages with entries",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
18,
28
]
],
"text": "Watch the seafoam drift away from your feet.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
0,
10
],
[
12,
22
]
],
"ref": "1884, Princeton University, Our Little Ones and the Nursery, volume 11, Estes and Lauriat, page 323:",
"text": "Drift away, drift away, 'mong the green islands,\n Lower the sail and away with the oar;\n Sing away, sing away, birds in the highlands,\n Answer the waves on the coral-strewn shore.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
108,
118
]
],
"ref": "2000, William Broyles, Cast Away, HarperCollins, page 72:",
"text": "He slowly lets the oar slide into the water, then does the same with the other oar, watching as they slowly drift away.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To slowly move away from a point, especially if on water."
],
"id": "en-drift_away-en-verb-AYMLCMad",
"links": [
[
"point",
"point"
],
[
"water",
"water"
]
],
"related": [
{
"_dis1": "100 0",
"word": "drift apart"
}
]
},
{
"categories": [],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
46,
56
]
],
"text": "I used to be close to it, but then I began to drift away.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
5,
15
]
],
"ref": "1872, Charles Kingsley, Poems by Charles Kingsley, Macmillan, page 315:",
"text": "THEY drift away. Ah, God! they drift for ever.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
34,
44
],
[
66,
76
]
],
"ref": "1850, H. Harbaugh, editor, The Guardian Volumes 37–38, page 216:",
"text": "A teacher who allows his class to drift away should be allowed to drift away himself, and his place taken by one who has grit and grace enough to hold the class.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
28,
38
]
],
"ref": "2006, Robert Kendall Brigham, ARVN (Life and Death in the South Vietnamese Army), University Press of Kansas, page 47:",
"text": "Over time soldiers began to drift away from the national cause.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To lose connection to a person, philosophy, or group over time."
],
"id": "en-drift_away-en-verb-NZAYeav9",
"links": [
[
"connection",
"connection"
],
[
"philosophy",
"philosophy"
],
[
"group",
"group"
],
[
"over time",
"over time"
]
]
}
],
"word": "drift away"
}
{
"categories": [
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English phrasal verbs",
"English phrasal verbs formed with \"away\"",
"English verbs",
"Pages with 1 entry",
"Pages with entries"
],
"forms": [
{
"form": "drifts away",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "drifting away",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "drifted away",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "drifted away",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "*"
},
"expansion": "drift away (third-person singular simple present drifts away, present participle drifting away, simple past and past participle drifted away)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"related": [
{
"word": "drift apart"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English terms with quotations",
"English terms with usage examples"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
18,
28
]
],
"text": "Watch the seafoam drift away from your feet.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
0,
10
],
[
12,
22
]
],
"ref": "1884, Princeton University, Our Little Ones and the Nursery, volume 11, Estes and Lauriat, page 323:",
"text": "Drift away, drift away, 'mong the green islands,\n Lower the sail and away with the oar;\n Sing away, sing away, birds in the highlands,\n Answer the waves on the coral-strewn shore.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
108,
118
]
],
"ref": "2000, William Broyles, Cast Away, HarperCollins, page 72:",
"text": "He slowly lets the oar slide into the water, then does the same with the other oar, watching as they slowly drift away.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To slowly move away from a point, especially if on water."
],
"links": [
[
"point",
"point"
],
[
"water",
"water"
]
]
},
{
"categories": [
"English terms with quotations",
"English terms with usage examples"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
46,
56
]
],
"text": "I used to be close to it, but then I began to drift away.",
"type": "example"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
5,
15
]
],
"ref": "1872, Charles Kingsley, Poems by Charles Kingsley, Macmillan, page 315:",
"text": "THEY drift away. Ah, God! they drift for ever.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
34,
44
],
[
66,
76
]
],
"ref": "1850, H. Harbaugh, editor, The Guardian Volumes 37–38, page 216:",
"text": "A teacher who allows his class to drift away should be allowed to drift away himself, and his place taken by one who has grit and grace enough to hold the class.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
28,
38
]
],
"ref": "2006, Robert Kendall Brigham, ARVN (Life and Death in the South Vietnamese Army), University Press of Kansas, page 47:",
"text": "Over time soldiers began to drift away from the national cause.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To lose connection to a person, philosophy, or group over time."
],
"links": [
[
"connection",
"connection"
],
[
"philosophy",
"philosophy"
],
[
"group",
"group"
],
[
"over time",
"over time"
]
]
}
],
"word": "drift away"
}
Download raw JSONL data for drift away meaning in All languages combined (2.9kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-10-21 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-10-01 using wiktextract (c1bb342 and 6f96ddf). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.