doleful

adj

1. Filled with grief, mournful, bringing feelings of sadness.

   “The doleful peal of the bell indicated another funeral was being held.”

   “A doleful expression that tugged at my heartstrings.”

   “A dungeon horrible, on all sides round, / As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames / No light; but rather darkness visible / Served only to discover sights of woe, / Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace / And rest can never dwell, hope never comes / That comes to all, but torture without end / Still urges, and a fiery deluge, fed / With ever-burning sulphur unconsumed.”

   “O King this is very doleful. It is told that that traveller came at last to the utter End and there was a mighty gulf, and in the darkness at the bottom of the gulf one small god crept, no bigger than a hare, whose voice came crying in the cold: “I know not.” And beyond the gulf was nought, only the small god crying.”

   ““We face a doleful future,” said Dr. Harvey V. Fineberg, a former president of the National Academy of Medicine.”