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malingering

Verb
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

The act of pretending to be ill or incapacitated in order to evade work, duty, or responsibility; a deceptive practice used to gain sympathy or avoid unpleasant tasks.

Detailed Definition
In older or more formal English, to malinger means to feign illness or incapacity. In this poem, the speaker says she is “malingering,” suggesting she is shirking work because of emotional distraction rather than real sickness.
Example
Example in poetry:
“He called in sick again, malingering beneath the quilt” means pretending or exaggerating illness to avoid duty; The quoted speaker hides from “diligent work, malingering,” joining shame to avoidance; A war poem may accuse an officer of calling a traumatized soldier a malingerer, exposing the term’s cruelty; “My heart malingering at the threshold” figuratively presents hesitation as evasion
Additional Notes
“malingering” is a specialized, less common verb here, and the line shows it in a context of avoiding work.; Found in the poem, A Love Song by D. H. Lawrence
Also Known As
procrastination dawdling delay idleness
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