brakować, braknąć, zabraknąć

I'm a bit confused about these words, how they're used, which ones are imperfective and which ones are perfective, which ones belong together, which one is used when... If anyone could shed some light on these words with an example or two of each I'd be grateful.

Zabraknąć is perfective and means to lake something-czegoś, or to be short of something
brakować and braknąć are both imperfective verbs meaning to be lacking or to be missing but braknąć is only used in the third person singular.

braknąć and zabraknąć often are used interchangeably

jutro nam braknie/zabraknie chleba - we will run out/short of bread tomorrow

so there can be confusion whether braknąć is perfective or imperfective

in fact many verbs with -nąć ending are perfectives - on time actions - palnąć, golnąć, łypnąć, machnąć

Jemu brakuje cierpliwości - is constant - He lacks patience
Jemu zabrakło cierpliwości - is a one moment effect - He has run short of patience.

Brakowało nam pieniędzy. - We kept on lacking/being short of money.
(Za)brakło nam pieniędzy. - (At a certain moment) we ran out/short of money

still in real life usages this opposition is not that stark as one can imagine - quite often imperftective constructions are used instead of perfective ones

First of all, they only come in the 3rd person singular. The dictionary says:
Braknąć is an imperfecive verb: "Brakło mi tchu / Brakło nam odwagi".
Brakować is an imperfective verb, too: "Brakowało nam odwagi / Tego tylko brakuje!".

Frankly, I don't understand why the dictionary says "braknąć" is imperfective. I feel it as a perfective one. "Zabraknąć" is described in the same dictionary as a perfective verb.

Thank you all. If I say "brakło mi pieniędzy" everyone would interpret that in the exact same way as "zabrakło mi pieniędzy"?

What about the form "braknie"? I did some Google searching, and it seems to work like an imperfective verb. Could it be that it's considered perfective in the past tense and imperfective in the present, something like braknie = brakuje and brakło = zabrakło? Or perhaps I'm just confused now.

An excellent monolingual Polish paperback for foreigners I used in the 90's was called "BRAK MI S£ÓW". I figured an still figure it means "I'M AT A LOSS FOR WORDS", but, if thinking in Polish, would probably come up with 'słów nie ma'.

In German, oddly enough, there's more or less a stock translation: "Es verschlug mir die Sprache" = I don't have the words.., or something like that. (not literally or word for word, of course!)

Yes, Strzyga and Co. it's precisely at times like these that a dictionary fails to be useful; the translator especially must rely on their own re-honed skills.

yes - as I stated these tend to be used interchangeably


I think your intuitions are quite right - perfective and imperfective are not that clearly opposite in the future (in Polish) as they are in the past

Pójdziesz do kina? Będziesz szedł do kina? and Idziesz do kina (with enough context) can well be used (and are used) interchangeably - the semantic differences are slight here - it is really a matter of nuance - Pójdziesz do kina? sugests that a more definite answer is expected, while będziesz szedł do kina is a more indirect form to ask a question and eventually Idziesz do kina? is at present the form of choice for asking someone if s/he is going to the movies in a stated time (on a stated day for example)

gumishu
Is any of this relevant to the original question about brakować?

Perhaps you mean 'lack'.