All 12 Uses of

cleave

in

Ulysses, by James Joyce

From drains, clefts, cesspools, middens arise on all sides stagnant fumes.†
Chpt 15

clefts = splits or cracks

The camel, lifting a foreleg, plucks from a tree a large mango fruit, offers it to his mistress, blinking, in his cloven hoof, then droops his head and, grunting, with uplifted neck, fumbles to kneel†
Chpt 15

cloven = split (or divided in two)

It burns, the orient, a sky of sapphire, cleft by the bronze flight of eagles.†
Chpt 15

The navvy, staggering forward, cleaves the crowd and lurches towards the tramsiding on the farther side under the railway bridge bloom appears, flushed, panting, cramming bread and chocolate into a sidepocket.†
Chpt 15

Uses with a meaning too rare to warrant foucs:

Dicers and thimbleriggers we hurried by after the hoofs, the vying caps and jackets and past the meatfaced woman, a butcher's dame, nuzzling thirstily her clove of orange.†
Chpt 2 *

clove = a dried flower bud or section of a garlic plant

Clove her breath was always in theatre when she bent to ask a question.†
Chpt 11

And they laughed, sporting in a circle of their foam: and the bark clave the waves.†
Chpt 12

Definitions:

(1) (cleave as in: cleave through)
to split or cut through something

Ironically, this word can mean to split in two or to hold together.

Note that you may see cleaved, cleft, clove, or cloven as the past tense of this sense of cleave.
(2) (cleave as in: cleave to)
to hold firmly to something -- such as an object, a person or idea

Ironically, this word can mean to split in two or to hold together.

Note that you may see cleaved, clove, or clave as the past tense of this sense of cleave.
(3) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
a proper noun or other word too rare to warrant focus