0 past simple and past participle of yearn
1 to wish very strongly, especially for something that you cannot have or something that is very difficult to have:
Despite his great commercial success he still yearns for critical approval.
[ + to infinitive ] Sometimes I just yearn to be alone.
The picturesque hinted at, and yearned for, other social and urbanistic possibilities than were on offer in a city of remorseless modernity.
Yearning is typically identified by a dull ache in the region of the diaphragm, a feeling of emptiness, and recurrent thoughts of the yearned-for object.
He yearned to be able to love himself and the world, but his insights into the black side of human nature stood in the way of this.
Their vocal style, lyric and composition do not set out to unsettle, and 'home' is often yearned for in idealised pastoral romantic terms.
They had yearned for peace, they had organised for peace.
I hope that they will show that they do not want anything that will frustrate the attainment of that much yearned-for millenium.
He yearned for conciliation—for the reconciliation of the feuds of centuries; he yearned passionately for it.
Naturally, because of their limited freedom, they yearned to walk among those hills.
