thistledown

plural thistledowns

1. uncountableusuallyThe soft, feathery pappus attached to the seeds of a thistle.

   Yet, let me not reproach myself, since the blame is due to her lightness of heart, her fickle fancy—no stabler than gossamer or thistledown—which the first wanton breath wafts elsewhere.

   1850, Mary Cowden Clarke, The Girlhood of Shakespeare's Heroines: A Series of Fifteen Tales

   1 more example

   “Oh,” said Zuleika, “of course I like being admired. Oh yes, I like all that very much indeed. In a way, I suppose, I’m even pleased that YOU admire me. But oh, what a little miserable pleasure that is in comparison with the rapture I have forfeited! I had never known the rapture of being in love. I had longed for it, but I had never guessed how wonderfully wonderful it was. It came to me. I shuddered and wavered like a fountain in the wind. I was more helpless and flew lightlier than a shred of thistledown among the stars. All night long, I could not sleep for love of you; nor had I any desire of sleep, save that it might take me to you in a dream. I remember nothing that happened to me this morning before I found myself at your door.”

   1911 October 26, Max Beerbohm, Zuleika Dobson, or, An Oxford Love Story, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: John Lane Company, published 1912, →OCLC