VIC'S VIEWPOINTS (Private)

Victim #11 - Parchment Perceptions (*edited)

Jason strolled into the shared bedroom and stopped near Victor's bed. The older teen sat cross-legged as he logged into Wattpad. Feeling his brother staring, Victor looked up.

Jason wore a yellow cape with 'POET MASTER' written on the back. Victor recognized the cape as an award from his middle school days for the student who wrote the best poem in the annual classroom contest. He shook his head in disbelief as he'd never known Jason to exhibit any talent in poetry. The child had barely passed English last semester.

"So, who'd you steal that from, mate?" he asked, as Jason began posing in his finery.

"You're just jealous you didn't win it when you were in middle school," countered Jason as he preened in the mirror. "The yellow goes good with my red hair, doesn't it?"

Victor ignored the question, running a hand through his own curly mop of hair. "Jason, seriously, how did you win the poetry cape?"

Jason smiled, "In case you don't know it, I am a poet." The boy raised his arms in glee. "I can't help but to rhyme. I'm that good!" He turned and pranced out of the room.

Shaking his head, Victor turned and gazed at the computer screen, and a smile crossed his handsome face. "Absolutely smashing, I've got a victim—Parchment Perceptions by @Queen_bee_Mariam. Alrighty, your Majesty. Not a connoisseur of poetry, but I love anthologies. Let's you and I give it a go, love."

He heard Jason shout out, "I heard poetry! If you need any help, the master poet is in da house!"

Rolling his eyes, as he still could not believe in Jason's supposed talent, Victor settled down to read.

^*^*^*^*^

An hour later, Victor uncurled stiff legs, padded to the door, and closed it. He stopped by his desk, picked up his digital recorder, and hopped back on the bed. Lying on a mound of pillows, he put the device to his lips and began to speak.

"Welcome to another exciting adventure of Vic's Viewpoints, where I will tease and entice you with endless yammering and prattling. Today I have quite the treat for you. Poetry and a story for an upcoming anthology. Parchment Perceptions by the talented Queen_bee_Mariam. As usual, at least for the story, I'll hit upon seven elements I think are important to a story. I'll also try a whiff of poetry, so forgive me, love, if I muck it up." The teen took a deep breath. "And here we go!"

I have little to no experience with poetry. I mean, yes, I read it, but an expert, no way. But what a lovely poem! I enjoyed the rhythm of it especially. A poem like this deserves to be read aloud to truly experience the beat. I admit I like poems with rhyming words, although you don't see as much of that today, which I find sad. It takes talent to rhyme, and I'm not talking about rappers, love.

I applaud you for such talent. Masterful piece! Then you write a type of explanation.

And this is where you lose me.

Your style of writing, to me, is quite flowery. You substitute in elaborate words and phrases for similar ones and use longer sentences to convey the ideas. Is flowery bad? In my book, no, as if it's done well, it gives the feel of an earlier period writing or setting of a mood. If poorly done or overdone, it will contain excessive adjectives and adverbs and sound a bit choppy or broken.

Take your first sentence, for example:

This anthology of which there are proses depicting fiction as well as nonfiction is written and proofread entirely by me, Samriddhi Saha.

Does the wordiness bother me? No. Did the passive nature bother me? No. I understand it will be written in a more elaborate style. Then it hit me. I then read it this way...