English

Adjective

ablow ‎(not comparable)

1. (obsolete, postpositive) Blossoming, blooming, in blossom.
   • 1867, Augusta Webster, “Lota”, in A Woman Sold and Other Poems, Macmillan and Co., page 238:

     “ […] The flower breaks from its sheath and is ablow

     And gives its richest perfumes.”  And I’d muse, […]

   • 1891, Lizette Woodworth Reese, “Hallowmas” (poem), in A Handful of Lavender, Houghton, Mifflin and Company, page 13:

     You know, the year's not always May —

     Oh, once the lilacs were ablow !

   • 1989, Stephen L. Swynn, Garden Wisdom: Or, from One Generation to Another, Ayer Publishing, ISBN 0836905024, page 110:

     […] against the green, yet, growing in tilled soil, grow stronger and taller than any daffodil can grow in turf : hundreds of them are ablow together, and the very robustness of their splendour […]

2. (dated, postpositive) Blowing or being blown; windy.

Usage notes

• Like most adjectives formed from this sense of a-, ablow never serves as an attributive premodifier; one can say “the flowers were ablow”, “ablow, the flowers […] ”, and even “ […] the flowers ablow […] ”, but not *“ […] the ablow flowers”.

Etymology 2

a- +‎ blow ‎(“alteration of below”)

Preposition

ablow

1. (Scotland) Below.