word of the day :: athwart

athwart:

[uh-thwawrt]

–adverb

1. from side to side of; crosswise.
2. Nautical.
        a. at right angles to the fore-and-aft line; across.
        b. broadside to the wind because of equal and opposite pressures of wind and tide: a ship riding athwart. 
3. perversely; awry; wrongly.

-preposition
4. from side to side of; across
5. Nautical. across the direction or course of.
6. in opposition to; contrary to.
 

Origin:

1425-75; late ME; see a-, thwart

"From forth his dark and lonely hiding-place, (Portentous sight!) the owlet Atheism, sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon, drops his blue-fringed lids, and holds them close, and hooting at the glorious sun in Heaven, cries out, 'Where is it?'"

:: Samuel Taylor Coleridge ::

* Definition from www.dictionary.com