This was the headline over a news item from Quebec: “Fences may have stopped avalanche.”

This was the headline over a story from Las Vegas: “Miracle Mile flooding may have been averted.”

In each instance, as the stories themselves made clear, the copy editor should have used “might” instead of “may.” Authorities in Quebec had recommended fences, but their advice had been ignored. In Nevada, a Clark County spokesman said proper land management “most definitely” would have alleviated the erosion that intensified the flood.

The verbal auxiliaries “may” and “might” are trickers. We’re not talking today of “may” in the sense of permission: “You may have a nightcap, but that’s all!” No, we’re talking probability. The general rule is that “may” conveys a higher degree of probability than “might.” Thus, “He may get falling-down drunk” carries a higher likelihood of tipsiness than “He might get falling-down drunk.”

In his massive work on syntax, professor George Curme provides examples. “She may miss the train” carries one degree of future possibility. “She might miss the train” implies a lesser degree of possibility. The same distinction works in the past tense. “She may have missed the train” conveys a stronger apprehension than “She might have missed the train.” In either case, it was Charlotte’s own fault. If she hadn’t stayed up past 3 o’clock in the morning …

The New York Times recently got it right: “Technology Sell-Off May Bring Shakeout of Dot-Com Concerns.” The San Antonio Express-News got it right in a story on oil demand: “World’s use may reach 66.8 million barrels a day.” But a photo editor in Augusta, Ga., probably erred in a caption: “The General Assembly might have to cut funding for nurse programs.”

The best advice I can offer on this issue is to think twice before rushing headlong into a may/might construction. The choice is a judgment call – but such judgment calls are a big part of the writer’s art.

Here’s another one: “awoken” or “awaken”? Reader Nancy Clark, who dwells somewhere in cyberspace, recently read “The Da Vinci Code” and was intermittently irked. On the first page she encountered, “I hope I have not awoken you.” In the epilogue she stumbled over, “She realized what had awoken him.” She winced at a dozen “awokened” in between.

In his “Modern American Usage,” Bryan Garner remarks that “The past-tense and past-participial forms of ‘wake’ and its various derivatives are perhaps the most vexing in the language.” He recommends wake/woke/waked (or woken), and awake/awoke/awaked (or awoken). The advice leaves Ms. Clark still adrift.

Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage offers no help. The verb “has not yet settled down from its long and tangled history.” “‘Awoken’ presents a special problem.” “British commentators are in some disarray.” “Our written evidence for American English use is weak.”

To the rescue! There is no “rule” on “wake” and its derivative forms. The choice rests largely in a writer’s ear. Does the sentence benefit from a long “o” (she awoke) or a long “a” (she awakened)? Two syllabic scoops or two and a half? The test is to read one’s stuff aloud. It may be that Mona woke up and Mabel waked up. Semantically speaking, there is not a dime’s worth of difference between one form or another. Either way, the dear girl overslept and missed the train.

James Kilpatrick is a syndicated columnist.

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