• enPR: poyz, IPA: /pɔɪz/

poise

1. A state of balance, equilibrium or stability.
2. Composure; freedom from embarrassment or affectation.
3. Mien; bearing or deportment of the head or body.
4. A condition of hovering, or being suspended.
5. (physics) A CGS unit of dynamic viscosity equal to one dyne-second per square centimetre.
6. (obsolete) Weight; an amount of weight, the amount something weighs.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, I.xii:

     as an huge rockie clift, / Whose false foundation waues haue washt away, / With dreadfull poyse is from the mayneland rift, / […] So downe he fell […]

7. The weight, or mass of metal, used in weighing, to balance the substance weighed.
8. That which causes a balance; a counterweight.

   • Men of unbounded imagination often want the poise of judgment.

• peso
• pansy
• pensive
• avoirdupois

• Spanish: contrapeso

• German: Gleichgewicht, Fassung
• Italian: stato di grazia
• Russian: равнове́сие

• French: assurance, aisance, sang-froid, aplomb
• German: Gelassenheit, Fassung
• Russian: уравнове́шенность
• Spanish: ponderación

• German: Haltung, Ausdruck

• French: poise
• German: Poise
• Italian: poise
• Portuguese: poise
• Spanish: poise

poise (poises, present participle poising; past and past participle poised)

1. (obsolete) To hang in equilibrium; to be balanced or suspended; hence, to be in suspense or doubt.

   • The slender, graceful spars / Poise aloft in air.

2. (obsolete) To counterpoise; to counterbalance.
   • c. 1603–1604, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act I, scene iii]:

     one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality

   • to poise with solid sense a sprightly wit

3. (obsolete) To be of a given weight; to weigh. [14th-17th c.]
4. (obsolete) To add weight to, to weigh down. [16th-18th c.]
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 2, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes, […], book II, printed at London: By Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], OCLC 946730821 ↗:

     Every man poiseth {{transterm

5. (now rare) To hold (something) with or against something else in equilibrium; to balance, counterpose. [from 16th c.]
   • 1597, William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet, I.2:

     you saw her faire none els being by, / Her selfe poysd with her selfe in either eye.

6. To hold (something) in equilibrium, to hold balanced and ready; to carry (something) ready to be used. [from 16th c.]

   I poised the crowbar in my hand, and waited.

   to poise the scales of a balance

   • Nor yet was earth suspended in the sky; / Nor poised, did on her own foundation lie.

7. To keep (something) in equilibrium; to hold suspended or balanced. [from 17th c.]

   The rock was poised precariously on the edge of the cliff.

8. To ascertain, as if by balancing; to weigh.

   • He cannot sincerely consider the strength, poise the weight, and discern the evidence.

• Russian: изготавливаться