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Tuesday, June 11, 2013

V Words

V


Vaal

If you travel through the land
South Africa there is a grand
River there that might be nice to see,

Called the Vaal a word that's Dutch
So meaning drab and dull or such
But only in colour apparently.



Vacillate

If you’re the type to vacillate
It means you do facilitate
A hesitant or unsure certainty
Implying that back and forth you swing
In your beliefs and your feelings
Making you act indecisively

Kind of like a person who
Holds up the rest of the queue
While they think about what they should eat
They “um” and “ah” and scratch their heads,
“Should I this, or that instead?
And should I take away or take a seat?”


Bovine/Vaccine


I met a cow one sunny day
And to him I said, "I must say
Would you like to join me for some tea?"
"Moo," he said, (that's cow for "yes")
"I would be glad to be your guest,
Just as long as you're not eating me!"

And with my fingers crossed behind
My back I said to the bovine,
"My dear sir I'm not the type to dine
Upon the meat of any beast
Such as yourself, I could not feast
Upon the flesh of anything vaccine!"

And what a pleasant guest was he
To have around that night for tea
For upon my favourite dinner plate
Sat my new found bovine friend,
After he had met his end,
To become nothing less than a steak!

Vaccinia


Way back in the olden days
It happened that some dairy maids
Touched the ailed udders of a cow
And none of them were very pleased
To catch from it a skin disease
Which gave them blisters and a furrowed brow

Cowpox was the malady
That put the maidens I'll at ease
A virus passed on from the cow to them
Related to vaccinia
But not so much to tinea
A shame there were no latex gloves back then!



Vacuous

It’s possible to say something
Without really saying anything
To make a statement that is void of essence

Remarks lacking real content
Are vacuous, a word that’s meant
To explain a speech empty of substance.



Vacuum Aspiration

When a body cavity
Or organ needs to be emptied
In the course of certain operations

Surgeons often then will use
A certain type of suction tube
A process known as vacuum aspiration.



Vade mecum

In the glove box of my ride
You will find it holds inside
A useful book, that is, my vade mecum
That is to say the manual
That gives me the instructional
Advice I need when my poor car is broken!

And as a writer wannabe
I also carry round with me
Something that they call a dictionary
The vade mecum that I read
As often as I feel the need
Expanding for me my vocabulary!

The saying is not an English phrase
But has been passed down from the days
When Latin was spoken more frequently
In English it can be seen
Vade mecum simply means
literally simply “go with me”.



Vagabond

To wander about and roam
From place to place without a home
Is to gallivant or vagabond

And if I was a person who
Lived that kind of life then you
Could also say I was a vagabond.


Vagary


Erratic and peculiar
Most certainly irregular
Is what is meant when vagary is said

As in the whimsy vagary
Of someone having a monkey
Bouncing tennis balls upon their head.


Vaunt

So fond of all my muscly bits
And proud of being so strong and fit
I feel it fit and fair that I should vaunt

That is to say to boast and brag
About the things I’m proud to have
And in your face my greatness I will flaunt!


Vegemite vs Marmite

For some strange reason Aussies like
A substance known as Vegemite
Which they like to spread upon their toast,
An almost blackish shade of brown
The taste of which might make you frown,
The first time of it's tasting's rather gross.

I guess it could be likened too
Something living on your shoe,
This greasy mess of concentrated yeast,
Or perhaps salty armpit
Or  maybe clotted vomit
Yet in the land of Oz it's quite a feast!

But I must indeed admit
The second time that you taste it
Isn't quite as bad as first it was,
Then the third is better still
You might eat more and more until
You realize you eat it just because

Your taste buds have all gone quite mad
Because you crave the stuff like mad
In quite the same way you might eat a scab,
Or the stuff inside your nose,
You know exactly how it goes,
You shouldn't do it but it's not that bad!

Now I feel compelled to tell
Of another spread from Hell
A greasy jar of gunk the Kiwis eat
Upon their toast and just as gross
The taste of which comes rather close
To the yeasty Aussie rival treat.

Marmite's the stuff that I now mean
Blacker still and like a spleen
Pureed down and jarred into a spread,
The Kiwis eat the stuff like mad
And if it runs out they get sad;
Without it half of NZ would drop dead!

And let me say before I go
Something only one would know
If you lived on my side of the earth
NEVER tell a Kiwi that
Vegemite is better, that
Will hurt their ego worse than childbirth!


Verbose

If I explained a thing to you
Way more than I needed to
By using lots of words for my example

I'm being verbose within my speech
Prattling in the way I teach
When only a few words would have been ample!


Verily

I can say definitely
What I’m saying is certainly
Absolutely confidently true

That is the adverb verily’s
True meaning is “truthfully”
As sure as one plus one does equal two!


Vermian

Recently I did invent
A gadget that I hoped was meant
To teleport me quick to the bellet,
Instead it did another thing
Quite different to anything
I thought it would and now I am afraid

That I have become a bit
Small and can no longer fit
My clothes for I'm as big now as a germ
And am now prey to vermian
Things for this new state I'm in
Makes me the right size for hungry worms.




Vex

To bring trouble or to distress
Like if you tore your favourite dress
Or found yourself being chased by a T-Rex,
Or anything that irritates
Annoys you or exasperates
Illustrates the meaning of to vex.

Something worth to know also
It used to be vexareto
Back when Latin commanded our tongues,
Said of things that agitate
Bug and burn or aggravate
Like accidentally stepping on some dung!

Especially if that dress you had
Cost more money than you had
Or if the dinosaur had a Segway,
I daresay that I would be vexed
To find myself in that context
And something’s number two got in my way!


Videlicet


I like to find words that are dead
I like to keep them in my head
For even though they've died they do elicit
That I have an intellect,
And therefore earn me some respect,
Take for instance the word videlicet
I'd bet my belly button lint
That the bulk of you haven’t
Heard the word until you heard it then
It simply means “that is to say”
Or “namely”, though not used to day,
It was used way back when Hamlet was penned.




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