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TUNNEL VISION
Tireless vessels worship God,
full of choc'late virtues.
Choc'late virtues keep away
more than twenty vices.
Twenty vices all transgress
real or topsy values.
Topsy values get their names
from some turvey vocabs.
Turvey vocabs are the bone,
bane of trusting virgins.
Trusting virgins find themselves
better trysting venues.
Trysting venues after death
ring with cheating verses.
Cheating verses spread the word,
cloaked in cherished vestments.
Cherished vestments shroud, between
walls, their truthless voices.
Truthless voices shine the light,
that of temple vot'ries.
Temple vot'ries show their zeal
with a tunnel vision.
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Vincent van Mechelen
63.LNW
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Every sentence in this poem corresponds with two lines: one of seven and
one of six syllables. The alliterative structure and meter for each pair of
lines is:
|T| x |V| x X x
X
X x |T| x |V| x.
In this formula a small letter stands for a syllable without primary
stress and a capital for one with primary stress. Syllables represented by
x or X may start with any sound. Obviously, the full forms of the words
choc'late and vot'ries are chocolate and the plural of
votary (a devout or zealous worshiper) respectively. As they are or
may be pronounced with three instead of two syllables, they cannot be used
here.
Three trochees in each line constitute the basic meter in this poem. A
stressed syllable is then added at the end of every odd line. This
system resembles very much the system as used in
The Lay of This
Our Language, except that there it is iambics which are repeated,
while every odd line receives an unstressed syllable at the end. But also
there each pair of lines consists of 6+1+6=13 syllables. A difference is
again that in Tunnel Vision two lines form a stanza and sentence,
whereas in The Lay four lines form a stanza and whole sentence.
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