Definition of "marcescent" []

• Withering but not falling off, as a blossom that persists on a twig after flowering. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Tremulous took the place of a brother's name, and yesterday, when he blanked on the cities where he grew up, he learned the meanings of lambent and marcescent."
• "“I, with my tremulous legs and marcescent arms, still love the garden's lambent light.”"
• ""But, " she answered, -granting that Mon Cul is a remarkable creature, that he is the elder statesman among monkeys, that his marcescent eyelids have opened upon sights and splendors about which the most romantic among us only dream, granting that, do not all wild animals have dignity?"