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Friday, November 5, 2021

5 Nov. 2021

||
Smiley face|| _usurp, taffy, outran, adjoin, at (the) "four-front".
Image(s) 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.

10 comments:

Sandyanon said...

Meh. YMMV.

OwenKL said...

Joe was known as the Boardwalk Snack Man,
The best taffy was at the shop he ran!
When a novel treat came about,
He was at the forefront to try it out!

But as he aged, an adjoining store
Stole his customers more and more.
The owner threatened his title to usurp,
By dunking things in chocolate syrup!

That was until his supply ran out
Of the tasty syrup he tried to tout!
Then folks drifted back to Joe's shop,
He outran his competition and stayed on top!

Ol’ Man Keith said...

An enjoyable morning stroll along your “boardwalk,” Owen! Thank you.

I am truly glad that his competitor ran out of syrup before Joe had to resort to deep frying any-and-everything, which seems to be today’s big fad.
Our dear nation is falling behind in a range of categories, but I believe we are holding our own in the Obesity Olympics.
~ OMK

Ol' Man Keith said...

“A BiFurcated Front

At birth the midwives didn’t write down
which of the royal twins was older,
so Council assigned to each a crown,
leaving the reign to "He-who-Proves-Bolder."

In sport, they aimed to make their bones,
noting who outran whom & who could swim
faster & farther; who threw the spear
more accurately & who instilled fear.
They sat upon adjoining thrones,
each fearing the other would usurp him.

And so they came to a fateful day,
when each man poisoned the other’s wine.
Finding no prudent way to say
“After you!”—they turned to crime.

And on each stone, the same epitaph: “He
would not share the Royal (half-) We.”
~ OMK

Misty said...

"Time of Life"

Teenage Burt did his best to usurp
attention with a slurp and a burp.
His diet was always daffy,
consisting of sweets and taffy,
and he always needed a coin
at the candy machine he'd adjoin.

He dreaded the time he outran
this young period's very brief span
and he had to become a man.
That's why he would grunt and be blunt
to keep his teen years in the forefront.

Ol' Man Keith said...

Misty, I used to find myself
adjoining many a candy machine--and giving in to temptation. That may be why I found myself with diabetes. Burt is lucky if he escaped that diagnosis.

Fortunately, I am in a sort of remission these days--on oral meds instead of the needle I used to endure. And I consume plenty of "fun" sized Snickers with no apparent ill-effect.
So weit, sehr gern, ja?

Burt's dread of outrunning his youth is one we (& blog colleagues) can understand. Sadly, he seems to associate vulgar behavior with those lost years.
Your poem reminds me of the Japanese movie I watched last night--a '50s flick called The Warped Ones, in which terrible manners seemed to represent juvenile delinquency.
~ OMK

Misty said...

I must have sadly deleted my response to your comments, OMK, but no problem, I can respond again.

I too was addicted to candy as a child and a teenager, and, like you, I too still enjoy an occasional Snickers bar.

Your Japanese movie sounds funny and a delight. Hope I find something similar on my TV. But it would be tough to fit it in with Columbo, and Castle, and Father Brown, and Doc Martin, and Ms. Fisher's Murder Mysteries, and Perry Mason, and Green Acres, and Gilligan's Island, and others and others.

Ol' Man Keith said...

Just to be clear, Misty, I do not recommend that movie.
The Warped Ones is by a director, Kurahara, whose work I wanted to see. It is influenced by James Dean or Brando in The Wild One, but rather than building dread of its outlaws, it just jangles the nerves with bad acting.
If my poem* today were ever to inspire a movie, I hope my twins would play their hands with some subtlety.
~ OMK
____________
*
I hope you found all the J-words in my piece today.

Misty said...

Glad I won't have to try to see 'The Warped Ones,' OMK.

It took me a while to find all the Jumble words in your poem, but I did. Two problems that took a bit of work to solve: "taffy" and the solution "at the four-front."
Clever, clever handling of those with "half-We" and "Fur-Front"--very clever.
Thanks for having me check them out: it was fun.

Ol' Man Keith said...

Almost, Misty, but not quite!

You are right to pinpoint TAFFY in the concluding couplet,
but just check again to see what it is that "(half-)We" rhymes with.

Or try speaking the couplet out loud.
~ OMK