ABSTRACT
Verbs activate sentences, bringing them to life, identifying actions, setting a mood, or telling time. Quite simply, verbs help us do and be. That’s right. In additions to actions, verbs also signal a state of existence, linking nouns or pronouns to a description: You are a magnificent writer. They even help out other verbs from time to time. But trouble erupts for many young writers when things get tense. Tense comes from the Latin word for time. Sure, when the past tense merely needs -ed slapped onto the end to transform to the past, or the present tense needs an s attached to its end to be present, or the future tense needs will in front of it to catapult a verb into the future, tenses are a cakewalk.
