# The Vicar, The Vixen and the Viscount



## Bloodstone Press (Apr 16, 2005)

Please let me know what you think of this short prose poem. 

The Vicar, the Vixen, and the Viscount​
Sitting in the vestry, the venerable Vicar viewed the Viscount with contempt. "When first we had tasted the veal of victory, you were valiant and true." he voiced.  "You were a viable veteran; your valor shown like a vesper. You were my votary, my vassal, my villein. You swore by the vellum that bears the Oath! 

“But now you are like a virus—malfeasant and revolting. By failing in your vigil, you have vitiated our vinculum. The village has been vulcanized because of your deviance! You are hereby charged with the venal violation of vending your loyalty. Vocalize you valediction!" 

The Viscount parried the Vicar’s assault,
"In my vat or in my vault,
There I sat; it was not my fault!"​
The Viscount continued to vaunt his deeds. He vocalized his virtue with voluminous valiance that veiled the view. Such was the varnish upon his words that many of the viceroys, who were voting on his fate, vacillated. But the Vicar's vision was fixed upon his vademecum, remaining unconvinced by the Viscount’s voluble verbs.

When the Viscount had finished, the Vicar invoked, "Your vignette of the venue is false!"  The Viscount struggled for verisimilitude, but the Vicar saw through the veneer of his words and questioned his veracity. "What of the verity of your words? Who will vouch for them? Who will vindicate you?"

The Viscount was vacant. Vainly he said, 
"I can neither prove nor verify,
What passed that day before my eye.
In my hall I was alone,
Of your plight I could not have known."​
Now the viceroys, set to vote, found the Vicar's conviction compelling and they vigorously voted for the death of the devilish Viscount. But the Vicar, being the visage of virtue, vetoed their vote of violence. Instead, he chose to vituperate the Viscount with vociferous vocabulary. His voice became a voluminous vortex of vehemence as he verbalized, "You rhyming deceiver! You bender of words! You vex me to the vein with your voluble verbs. Your loyalty is vapid and variable like the winds!" With virulence he voiced, "You vermiform _thing_!" 

The Viscount cowered like a vole beneath the Vicar's vesicant vituperations. His virility was vandalized, his vanity vanquished. As the Viscount quivered with convulsions, the Vicar conveyed his final verdict. "For your vague actions and vainglory words, your villa will be vacated. Betrayal is a virus—banishment shall be the vaccine!" With these words he cursed him with vagrancy, damned to follow the vane. 

The Viscount's heart was a void as he fled from the forum in disgrace. He left the vale of Valimar and rode away over the Verdigris Hills. Like a vagabond he wandered, lost and forlorn for fifty fortnights and more, until he ventured near the vicinity of the Verdant Veldt.

Now there was a Vixen who lived in those fields, and she was like Venus with velvety skin. Her body was svelte and she wore a vicuna vest. 

When the Viscount came near, he beheld, across the veldt, the Vixen fine and fair.

"What is this?
Some sweet miss
Alone and wandering there?
Might I hope to presume
She is in need of a groom,
A provider of love and care?
No man could refute her,
I must be her suitor
And caress her vermilion hair!"​
Now the Vixen was a vocal virtuoso and an effectual violist. At first, the Viscount was simply impressed with her virtuosity, but as she sang, he became enraptured by her villanelle. Her voice was like veronal and he swooned with the vertigo induced by her verse. Soon, the Viscount brought her violets and professed her his valentine.

She began to feed him the veal of empathy and he feasted voraciously upon it. Hers was the voice of vindication. "He shouldn't have vituperated you so," she sympathized. But in time, the Vixen became a virago and her words became violent. She worked a volley of voodoo to infect him with a vendetta and convert his convictions. Into his vacuous heart she poured the venom of vengeance, filling him with villainy.

At her volition, he traversed in reverse across the vista. He left the Verdant Veldt and returned over the Verdigris Hills, venturing back to Valimar with vengeance in his veins. When he reached the vast, viridescent vale, he veered westward, riding for the vicarage. Employing vulpine evasions and a falsified visa, he arrived at the Vicar's door without being divulged. He entered the vestry and found the Vicar, wearily sipping the vintage of the vine. 

"I do venerate thee, Vicar," He vindictively voiced. 

"Who are you to invade my vacation?" the Vicar demanded.

In answer, the Viscount lifted his visor, revealing his visage. Malevolently, he stroked his vogue van-dyke.

"Ah ha!" said he. 
“Vis-à-vis
Again are we."​
"You viper!" the Vicar spat, "what villainy have you brought?"

"I have come to slay you 
With the swiftest velocity,
For your villainous crime
Of voluminous verbosity!"​
At this the Vicar fled from the forum with vibrating viscera. The Viscount, following after, caught him in the vivarium. He seized the Vicar among the verbena plants and victimized him with his vanadium blade. Violent was his heart and vicious were his deeds as he vented his vengeance upon the Vicar. When at last the vile vulgarity was done, the Vicar lay vanquished, his vitals exposed for the vultures to feed. 

Alas, the Viscount looked upon his work but he was not invigorated. In fact, he was now free of the Vixen’s infection that had invoked his involuntary involvement in this vile affair. Liberated from her veronal, he convulsed with the vivid view of his villainy. 

"The Vixen," he said, "like a vampire feeds,
Vicariously upon my gory deeds.
For venereal desires I slew my lord . . ."​ 
In despair, he vaulted upon his sword.



 (copyright 2005)


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## Herremann the Wise (Apr 16, 2005)

very... very... vivid  

The beauty of the English language never fails to amaze me.   

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise


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## Bloodstone Press (Apr 17, 2005)

Thanks. Yeah, the English language can be a lot of fun. 

 I'd really like to hear some more comments from more people about this piece  I'd like to know more about how people feel about it. Do they like it? if so, why? If not, why? Is there a part that they particularly like or dislike?


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## shilsen (Apr 18, 2005)

It's an interesting display of virtuosity, but that's about all. And has a lot of really painful use of language, ranging from words that are being used awkwardly (which is most of it, actually) to just plain incorrectly.


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## Bloodstone Press (Apr 18, 2005)

which words are used incorrectly?


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## shilsen (Apr 18, 2005)

veal, viable, vesper, vulcanized - in just the first 2 paragraphs. And a lot more if one considers awkward usage, of course.


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## Bloodstone Press (Apr 18, 2005)

The "Veal of Victory" is wrong?? 

 Its a poem, man. 

Metaphor, consonance, eye-rhymes etc. ....

All the  (unusual) words have been thoroughly researched. The piece has also been vetted by two editors, one of which has a doctorate in English lit. If I've misused a word, please let me know. But I don't think the examples you cited meet the criteria of "incorrect." Granted, there is a great deal of poetic license that has been taken... but then it is a (prose) poem, you know. 

Veal: the tender, succulent meat (of a calf )
vesper: The evening star
Viable: Able to survive on one's own (outside the womb/protection of progenerater)
Vulcanized: -- ok, you got me here. Yeah, its not used to mean that the  (rubber) village has been  strengthened with heat... but it does allude to the idea of the village being subjected to a great deal of heat (i.e. burned) 

 I'll give that last one a little more thought. 

 Does anyone else have any comments about it, good or bad?


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