From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishkeep your eyes/ears openkeep your eyes/ears openNOTICEto keep looking or listening so that you will notice anything that is important, dangerous etc → openExamples from the Corpuskeep your eyes/ears open• All of you - walk around Pentonville and keep your ears open.• Go back to bed only when you can no longer keep your eyes Open.• Swing the boat south, keep her eyes open.• The daily firings produced by the withering economy offered loopholes of opportunity for a young man who kept his eyes open.• The basic rules of self-defence are quite simple: keep your eyes open and you can usually avoid trouble.• You know how to keep your eyes open and your mouth shut.• Remembering his duty, he strode briskly up the stairs, keeping his eyes open for any suspicious signs.• By then keeping her eyes open was less of an effort.
In Chinese, we use an expression which literally "I'm so tired and my eyes could only focus on one point [or my eyeballs can not move anymore]" after a long workday to express that we are extremely tired.
I want to know whether there are similar expressions related to eyes to express tired?
EDIT: I also want to know if I can say 'I've got two glazed eyes after finishing all my work' to express my tiredness? And can a native speaker understand what I want to express after hearing this？
Alan Carmack
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asked Sep 21, 2016 at 11:56
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answered Sep 21, 2016 at 13:40
stangdonstangdon
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Weary-eyed is an expression that means "with eyes that look tired".
From: Family finances for the flabbergasted:
* I know I'd find weary-eyed fathers waiting for lost sons and weary-eyed sons waiting for lost fathers. We live lives of remarkable similarity
From: Sealskin and shoddy: working women in American labor press fiction
* The weary-eyed mother watched her stealthily. How pretty — and how like the girl he had married! She sighed.
Weary:
physically or mentally exhausted by hard work, exertion, strain, etc.; fatigued; tired: weary eyes; a weary brain.
Dictionary.com
answered Sep 21, 2016 at 12:03
One expression is bleary-eyed.
Definition from Merriam Webster:
having the eyes dimmed and watery [as from fatigue, drink, or emotion]
Example usage from the New York Times:
By the end of Alabama's 48-43 victory over Ole Miss in a Southeastern Conference showdown on Saturday, a weary, bleary-eyed Saban looked exhausted when the clock finally hit all zeroes.
answered Sep 21, 2016 at 12:59
dmrdmr
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When someone is looking tired they are said to have "bags under their eyes" or be "baggy-eyed".
From idiomeanings.com:
After partying all night, Thomas had bags under his eyes the next day.
Another one is to have "heavy eyelids," "heavy eyes," or "heavy lids."
From the Oxford Dictionary:
‘an elderly man with a deep-lined, heavy-eyed face’
answered Sep 21, 2016 at 13:08
EricEric
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To answer the edited question:
Can I say "I've got two glazed eyes"
Yes, it's comprehensible. Saying eyes are "glazed" or "glazed over" means that they're not focussing as expected. This is associated with tiredness or eye-strain. Be aware when using it that it's also [perhaps more strongly] associated with being bored, in general with not concentrating and with not looking at any particular thing. So depending on context there may be some ambiguity whether your work was exhausting or just boring. If you've finished the work and moved on to something else, and your eyes are still glazed, then I'd tend to interpret it as tiredness.
I think it's more natural to say "my eyes are glazed" rather than "I have two glazed eyes".
I can't give you a rule for when English-speakers put redundant numbers in, and when we don't. In this case I think it can go without saying that you have two eyes, and that over-work causes both to be equally glazed. Some people have fewer eyes, but using the plural rules that out, it must be at least two. So there's no need to tell the listener exactly how many eyes you have [although if you had three or more eyes then it might be of interest to mention it].
answered Sep 22, 2016 at 10:04
Steve JessopSteve Jessop
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My mom often said
Prop your eyes open with toothpicks.
For example
I was so tired today that I had to prop my eyes open with toothpicks.
answered Sep 21, 2016 at 15:41
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You can use the expression 'Glossy Eyed' ....
"I'm so tired I'm all glossy eyed."
"Look how glossy eyed those guys are over there after all that gaming."
"We smoked too many joints and are all glossy eyed" [also can be used in the context of cannabis]
answered Sep 22, 2016 at 10:31
This is extremely informal, and crass, but if someone has really had no sleep [e.g. they have been out partying], you might say "Wow, you have eyes like piss-holes in the snow!" Obviously very rude, and not one for polite company! Between good friends only, and people who are happy with expletives [piss]! I'll leave you to imagine the simile for yourself here ;]