stargaze
verbUS /ˈstɑɹɡeɪz/
Etymology From star + gaze.
1
To look at the stars at night.
- It was a very clear night so I paused to stargaze until I got cold and went in.
- "That's right," declared Browning's companion. "I was out stargazing last night. Looked at the Long-Handled Dipper a long time, and it gave me an awful thirst. I've had it with me all day. Yes, mine's ale."1903, Burt L. Standish [pseudonym; Gilbert Patten], Frank Merriwell at Yale:
2
Figuratively To gaze engrossed with emotion or contemplatively.
- Before books came into my life, I was given to stargazing and daydreaming. When books were given me, I fell upon them as a glutton pounces on his meat after a period of enforced starvation.1912, Mary Antin, The Promised Land:
- Derived terms
- astare, overstare, staree, starer, stareworthy, starey, stargazin, stargazy pie