High in the citadel the monstrous frame / pours forth an armed deluge to the day, / and Sinon, puffed with triumph, spreads the flame. / Part throng the gates, part block each narrow way; / such hosts Mycenae sends, such thousands to the fray."

It's all frayed.

Detective Columbo is always in a frayed raincoat.

I do not believe progress is possible if our desire to preserve our identities gives way to an impulse to dehumanize or dominate another group. If our religion leads us to persecute those of another faith, if we jail or beat people who are gay, if our traditions lead us to prevent girls from going to school, if we discriminate on the basis of race or tribe or ethnicity, then the fragile bonds of civilization will fray.

The way he returned into the fray to rescue his comrade is, for lack of a better word, praiseworthy.

The cuffs of his suit jacket are badly frayed.

Frayed electrical cables can be very dangerous.

Tom purchased several yards of screening from the hardware store to replace the old mesh in the window screens, since the mesh had become too frayed and torn to serve its purpose.

That extension cord looks dangerous to me. You see where it's frayed there?

All this bickering is starting to fray my nerves.