pensive, adj. dreaming, dreamy, dreamful, in a reverie, daydreaming, gazing out the window, in a trance, absent-minded; thoughtful, thinking, cerebra-tional, absorbed, immersed, engrossed, lost in thought, bemused, Archaic, museful; cogitative, cogitating, contemplative, contemplating, meditative, meditating, musing, pondering, reflective; ruminative, ruminant, ruminating, chewing, chewing one's cud, mulling over, brooding, in a brown study; sulking, sulky, moody, gloomy, glum, somber, sullen, morose; dispirited, cheerless, joyless, wistful, yearning, melancholy, sad; heavy-hearted, heartbroken, woeful, woebegone, forlorn, sorrowful, dreary, doleful, rueful, mournful, lamenting, bemoaning, bewailing, grieving. pent, adj. cooped in or up, encaged, caged, cribbed, mewed, boxed in or up, shut in or up, closed in, confined; fenced in, walled in, railed in, corralled, hemmed in, hedged in, bound, enclosed; interned, impounded, immured, cloistered, entombed, imprisoned, incarcerated. pent-up, adj. bottled up, corked up, shut up or in, closed up or in, confined; held in, sealed off, kept inside or within or secret, hidden; held back, restrained, constrained, checked, curbed, bridled, repressed, suppressed. penurious, adj. 1. stingy, parsimonious, miserly, carking, skinflinty; mean, tight, tight-fisted, close-fisted; cheap, SI. chintzy, moneygrubbing, grasping; niggardly, Rare, illiberal, cheeseparing; scrimping, penny-pinching, grudging, begrudging, ungenerous, stinting; thrifty, frugal, sparing, chary; economical, prudent, saving, penny-wise.
2. poverty-stricken, destitute, extremely poor; indigent, necessitous, in need, needy, distressed, impoverished; out at the elbows, shabby, shoddy, in rags, bad or badly off; pauperized, reduced, ruined, Inf. on the rocks.
3. penniless, Inf. broke or flat broke, busted, Inf. hard up, SI. stony or stone-broke; bankrupt, out of pocket, without funds, moneyless, impecunious; depleted, drained, strapped, pinched, straitened, pressed; tight, stinted, restricted, limited; deprived, bereft, empty-handed.
4. lacking, wanting, shy, deficient; insufficient, inadequate, beggarly; skimpy, scanty, meager, scrimpy, scant; very little, paltry, poor, piddling, insubstantial, Inf. measly, mere. penury, n. 1. poverty, extreme poverty, destitution, need, want; straits, straitened circumstances, beggary, pauperism, pauperage; mendicancy, mendicity; impecuniousness, insolvency, bankruptcy, inability to pay, liquidation, failure, default; privation, deprivation.
2. dearth, absence, scarcity, scarceness; inadequacy, insufficiency, lack, deficiency, shortage, shortness, stint, not enough to go around; scantiness, paucity, exiguity; meagerness, rareness, sparseness, seldomness, fewness, poorness, barrenness; depletion, exhaustion, emptiness, vacuity. people, n. 1. humans, human beings, human race, members of the human race, humankind, mankind, race of man, Latin. Homo, Homo sapiens; mortals, persons, souls, living souls; men, women, children, individuals; everybody, Fr. tout le monde, the whole world.
2. race, tribe, clan, community; nation, country, state; society, public, populace, population; members, fellows, membership, voters, constituency, residents, clientele.
3. relations, relatives, kin, kinfolk, kinsmen, next of kin, kith and kin; family, Inf. folk, parents, father, mother, spouse, children, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, Inf. kissing cousins, extended family, old friends; ancestors, strain, house, line, dynasty.