荏苒

rěnrǎn

verb

Meanings

HSK 6

岁月荏苒，这条老街却没有多少变化。

Suìyuè rěnrǎn, zhè tiáo lǎo jiē què méiyou duōshao biànhuà.

The years have slipped by, yet this old street has hardly changed.

HSK 7-9

时光荏苒，转眼我们已经毕业十年了。

Shíguāng rěnrǎn, zhuǎnyǎn wǒmen yǐjing bìyè shí nián le.

Time slips by: in the blink of an eye, ten years have passed since we graduated.

Literary. It follows a word for time, 时光, 岁月 or 光阴, usually at the start of a reflective sentence; 光阴荏苒 is the set form.

memory

Both characters carry the grass radical 艹: like grass growing, time moves too slowly to see, yet it is gone before you notice.

荏 rěn

苒 rǎn