vex

The title of the Donne poem is “Oh, to Vex Me, Contraries Meet as One.”

Please torment, harass, vex, heckle, and badger those two blockheads until they honor their commitments to my defense fund.

I do not intend to vex or grieve you by any conduct of mine; nor do I mean to leave you, now you are both infirm and old.

I didn't mean to vex you, dear Margaret; I like nothing so well, only we are never alone, and I've no time.

In comes Will Joyce to us drunk, and in a talking vapouring humour of his state, and I know not what, which did vex me cruelly.

Oh dear, if she has written so as to vex Aunt Alison, and we get blamed for it, and everything is spoilt!'

"No, Adolphe tries to vex me, he's going slower," says the young wife to her mother.