| || obese, third, poetic, lichen, beside (the) point.
Image from the Internet.
The opening poem contains all the words (or variations of them) from today's Jumble.
Comments are welcomed! And couching them in Poetry is definitely NOT required.
Do not explicitly reveal any of the actual answer words until after closing time, but embedding them surreptitiously in comment sentences is encouraged.
15 comments:
This solution stumped me for awhile. Stared and stared at those letters until finally the light broke. Okay, I get the connection between word and object. Good thing I'm no longer looking for real honest-to-goodness puns.
Heck of a big rock on the end of that branch; not easy to throw straight, I bet!
Owen was fat; obese to put it baldly.
A state that he bemoaned, often loudly.
And yet he still ate all that he was served,
Always wanting seconds, and sometimes thirds!
By his skills at eating he was defined,
His greatest talent flowering when he dined.
He also had some small skill as a poet,
And strove at every chance he got to show it.
But then along came Jean, who loved his verse.
His size beside the point, she was a nurse.
She put him on a diet of grass and lichen.
Which was sad, in that lichen did not like him!
I should clarify, I am only partially the Owen of this poem. I am obese and do have some tiny skill at poetry. But I'm actually a very light eater. My obesity is because 1) what I did eat was very high-calorie, and 2) I am very lazy and refuse to exercise. Also Jean is a composite, not anyone I actually know.
"Pointing to the Past, Or?"
An obese elder runner goes puffing around the bases,
the only sign of life on our old playground diamond.
The guy's sweatsuit is stained; his shoes sport loose laces.
I wonder if he'll complete even one more base run.
Was he once a young player? Is this his home toss?
A sad, faded relic. I once played on this pitch.
The rubber is gone; there's lichen and moss
on the base bags. Third base is torn up, its canvas all split.
I remember the smell of fresh grass in the infield
and the sight of bright baselines fresh chalked.
One game comes back specially, when Coach had me steal
three times, and the opposing pitcher then balked.
This old dirt means something, a poetic metaphor?
or I don't want to admit it's just a scruffy bore.
~ OMK
Fact or fiction, Owen, or a mix in between, it comes across as a sweet reminiscence of love's saving grace.
Thanks for this starter, a short tale that Misty might model as another happy marriage of true minds!
I'm off to campus this morning, for my 2nd COVID shot!
~ OMK
Delightful, funny poem, Owen, and a pleasure to get your neat explanation. Great start to our morning.
And, Ol' Man Keith, I can't believe how you glided those Jumble words into your clever sports poem. Had to look for them carefully, and there they were. More Friday fun.
Different relationship coming up in my poem, this morning.
"Nice Niece"
Nancy had a nice, sweet niece,
who was just a little obese.
To tease her would be absurd,
so Nancy gave her a bird--
then another, another, and a third,
which made them a dear little herd.
The niece found the parrots poetic,
elegant, cheerful, aesthetic.
Their cage she furnished with lichen,
and her care showed she really liked them.
Now the niece, with bright birds there beside
her, does happily at home reside,
in community, all four now a joint,
her obesity beside the point.
I'm back from completing my COVID shots!
I seem to have timed it perfectly. I was in and out within 40 minutes--including the 15 minute waiting period after the shot.
But on my way out, I saw the wait line had grown a full city block's worth, from the entry to the garage to the entrance to the Bren Center itself.
Whew!
Misty ~ Yes, your poem is definitely on a new tack.
Nancy's niece is a bird lady, eh?--a variation on the clichéd cat lady? Who needs to care about their "little obese" image, when their only companions are birds?
I gotta kick how you build the "dear little herd" of "birds," one bird at a time!
It seems to me you have found the key to understanding both the cat-lady and bird-lady variants of the archetypal "spinster," i.e., a life "beside the point"!
~ OMK
Misty, a nice poem, as yours always are. One little math quibble. "then another, another, and a third," adds up to 4, not three. It should be "then another, and another made a third,". Sorry, it's my math background coming out to criticize a pretty poem that doesn't deserve it.
Congrats on getting both shots, OMK. It's a relief to have it over, isn't it?
Although I have read some rumors about maybe a third shot eventually, because of all the variants cropping up. Don't know if they're well-founded or just idle talk.I
That's a fair call, Owen. I missed it too, Misty, which just goes to show my typically lousy math b.g. for a major in Drama & minor in Philosophy.
I am always a bit shocked by how we "liberal artists" seem to express an inverted pride about our poor math skills. As an adult I regret not knowing trig and calculus. I tried to self-teach, but I find it much harder to wrap my wits around these once the brain has "matured."
Sandy ~ Yep, I feel real relief now--knowing it will be something else to do me in.
I actually kinda wonder what it will be--as nobody in my family has lived as long as I have. My parents died younger, of things that probably won't get me. I am a monument to modern medicine & Big Pharma...
My job now is to keep my sons updated.
~ OMK
Yes, I guess I'm more into rhymes and meter than into math, Owen, so thanks for getting me to be more careful about that. Will try to do better tomorrow.
Misty, when ERATO met Archimedes the poetic EUREKA was born: eg The license to flub the math. In my head I too was counting but before I could go back and "Do the Math" Owen had beat me to it.
I think we had OBESE at CC. A couple of tough 6's esp POETIC - A CSO to the group.
Although I'd better get rhyming
I was following along on Owen's bio but didn't recognize the nurse. Not a fan of that lichen diet; I stopped the fad diets and then just ate half of my servings.
My friend is a Korea vet and at lunch he ordered a while steak and devoured it. Is there no justice?
OMK, you can't go wrong with a baseball theme Wilbur always says. I inked a few a few months ago.
WC
Well, what'ya know. From impossible to the TADA. Since I posted previously I started and finished the Saturday xword.
It will look impossible - at least I thought so. Then you fill square by square and all of a sudden it's fine.
A miracle. After filling it seems not so hard but there was precious little hanging fruit.
Good luck, let me know how you do.
WC
Now for the Jumble
Btw, it's not crocodiles, they don't have them in the Amazon. It didn't fit anyway but inked up the xword.
Post a Comment