bursting

comparative more bursting · superlative most bursting

1. Very eager (to do something).

   I was bursting to tell him the secret.

2. oftenUrgently needing to urinate.

   The kid is bursting to go to the toilet.

   1 more example

   Can you tell me where the toilets are? I'm bursting.

3. So full (with something) as almost to erupt.

   Her heart was bursting with repressed emotion.

   1 more example

   The newly stocked refrigerator is bursting with fresh vegetables.

1. gerundparticiplepresentpresent participle and gerund of burst

plural burstings

1. The act by which something bursts.

   the burstings of balloons

   2 more examples

   The locomotive involved in the derailment of the 4.33 a.m. train from Ruabon to Barmouth on the night of October 6, due to the bursting of the banks of the Shropshire Union Canal near Llangollen, was 2-6-0 No. 6315; the position into which the locomotive fell so completely defied all attempts to re-rail it that it was cut up on the spot.

   1946 January and February, “Notes and News: Locomotive Notes: G.W.R.”, in Railway Magazine, page 55

   Serious as was the flood damage in England, the bursting of some of the dykes on the coast of Holland resulted in an even more widespread and devastating inundation.

   1953 April, “Devastation in Holland”, in Railway Magazine, page 217