poor

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

• adj. Having little or no wealth and few or no possessions.
• adj. Lacking in a specified resource or quality: an area poor in timber and coal; a diet poor in calcium.
• adj. Not adequate in quality; inferior: a poor performance.
• adj. Lacking in value; insufficient: poor wages.
• adj. Lacking in quantity: poor attendance.
• adj. Lacking fertility: poor soil.
• adj. Undernourished; lean.
• adj. Humble: a poor spirit.
• adj. Eliciting or deserving pity; pitiable: couldn't rescue the poor fellow.
• n. People with little or no wealth and possessions considered as a group: The urban poor are in need of homes.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

• adj. With little or no possessions or money.
• adj. Of low quality.
• adj. To be pitied.
• adj. Deficient in a specified way.
• adj. inadequate, insufficient
• n. Those who have little or no possessions or money, taken as a group.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

• adj. Destitute of property; wanting in material riches or goods; needy; indigent.
• adj. So completely destitute of property as to be entitled to maintenance from the public.
• adj. Destitute of such qualities as are desirable, or might naturally be expected.
• adj. Wanting in fat, plumpness, or fleshiness; lean; emaciated; meager
• adj. Wanting in strength or vigor; feeble; dejected.
• adj. Of little value or worth; not good; inferior; shabby; mean.
• adj. Destitute of fertility; exhausted; barren; sterile; -- said of land.
• adj. Destitute of beauty, fitness, or merit.
• adj. Without prosperous conditions or good results; unfavorable; unfortunate; unconformable.
• adj. Inadequate; insufficient; insignificant.
• adj. Worthy of pity or sympathy; -- used also sometimes as a term of endearment, or as an expression of modesty, and sometimes as a word of contempt.
• adj. Free from self-assertion; not proud or arrogant; meek.
• n. A small European codfish (Gadus minutus); -- called also power cod.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

• Possessing little; destitute of wealth: opposed to rich: as, a poor man; a poor community.
• Lacking means to procure the comforts of life; indigent; needy; necessitous; specifically, in law, so destitute or impoverished as to be dependent upon charity, or upon the poorrates; pauper.
• Deficient in or destitute of desirable or essential qualities; lacking those qualities which render a thing valuable, desirable, suitable, or sufficient for its purpose; inferior; bad: as, poor bread; poor health; cattle in poor condition.
• In particular— Of little consequence; trifling; insignificant; paltry: as, a poor excuse.
• Mean; shabby: as, a poor outfit; poor surroundings.
• Lean; meager; emaciated: as, poor cattle.
• Lacking in fertility; barren; exhausted: as, poor land.
• Lacking in spirit or vigor; feeble; impotent.
• Destitute of merit or worth; barren; jejune: as, a poor discourse; a poor essay.
• Unfortunate; to be pitied or regretted: much used colloquially as a vague epithet indicative of sympathy or pity for one who is sick, feeble, or unhappy, or of regret for one who is dead.
• Miserable; wretched: used in contempt.
• Humble; slight; insignificant: used modestly in speaking of things pertaining to one's self.
• n. In England, a gadoid fish, Gadus minutus.
• To pet in a pitying, compassionate way.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• n. people without possessions or wealth (considered as a group)
• adj. characterized by or indicating poverty
• adj. not sufficient to meet a need
• adj. having little money or few possessions
• adj. unsatisfactory
• adj. lacking in specific resources, qualities or substances
• adj. deserving or inciting pity