as in fissure
an irregular usually narrow break in a surface created by pressure
my fishing line managed to get wedged in a cleft in the rocks
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Recent Examples of cleft
Doctors couldn't tell her how severe the cleft would be or any other complications that may be involved with Benji's diagnosis.
—
Daniella Gray, MSNBC Newsweek, 18 July 2025
The group of four were scaling the Early Winters Spires, jagged peaks split by a cleft that is popular with climbers in the North Cascade Range, about 160 miles northeast of Seattle.
—CBS News, 14 May 2025
But today, the most important political cleft is not the fading distinction between right and left, but the rising conflict between liberal and illiberal, democratic and autocratic.
—David Frum, The Atlantic, 28 Mar. 2025
Many birth defects are treatable; orofacial clefts and some heart defects, for example, can be corrected with surgery.
—Almut Winterstein, The Conversation, 30 Jan. 2025
See All Example Sentences for cleft
Daniella Gray, MSNBC Newsweek, 18 July 2025
The group of four were scaling the Early Winters Spires, jagged peaks split by a cleft that is popular with climbers in the North Cascade Range, about 160 miles northeast of Seattle.
—CBS News, 14 May 2025
But today, the most important political cleft is not the fading distinction between right and left, but the rising conflict between liberal and illiberal, democratic and autocratic.
—David Frum, The Atlantic, 28 Mar. 2025
Many birth defects are treatable; orofacial clefts and some heart defects, for example, can be corrected with surgery.
—Almut Winterstein, The Conversation, 30 Jan. 2025
See All Example Sentences for cleft
Recent Examples of Synonyms for cleft
Noun
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So, too, does the idea that a soccer coach could close fissures that even the well-meaning among career politicians have failed to seal.—
Jon Allsop,
New Yorker,
18 June 2026
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The group is particularly interested in suspending, fracturing, and reconstructing time through which othered bodies and identities pass, and in exploring the attendant emerging fissures.—
News Desk,
Artforum,
17 June 2026
Noun
-
The crevices may not be fully cleaned through the dishwasher.—
BestReviews,
Mercury News,
19 June 2026
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The four baby falcons hatched in early May, laid by a five-year-old falcon named Vixen, who began nesting in a crevice on the second floor of the exterior of Aurora City Hall in early April.—
Molly Morrow,
Chicago Tribune,
18 June 2026
Cite this Entry
“Cleft.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/cleft. Accessed 22 Jun. 2026.
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