All hints are in the comments!

Thursday, January 13, 2022

13 Jan. 2022

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|Smiley face| _furry, title, nuance, pewter, "reel" treat.
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.

8 comments:

OwenKL said...

The Cosplay Con was showing all sorts.
Brawny Barbarians in just their shorts!
Chipmunks and other such squirrely furries,
But impugn their costumes and risk their furies!

The Anime room was showing reel after reel;
For the Japanimation fans, the treat was real!
Video gamers were sequestered with their 'puters,
While tabletop gamers had characters of pewters!

The Secret Masters of Fandom Conventions
Sighed at the nuance of these new conventions.
The hucksters' room was devoid of titles.
No books at all, not a jot nor a tittle!

OwenKL said...

I'm rather proud of the rhymes in this one! But it may need a glossary.

Cosplay: costume play, people who dress like science fiction or fantasy characters.
Con: convention, originally just sci-fi, but now there are ones for various spin-off interests.
Furries: people who dress up like animals, and sometimes really get into their characters.
Anime or Japanimation: Japanese style cartoons, usually superheros.
Tabletop gamers: fantasy role-playing gamers who use pewter figures of their heroes and monsters. Carefully painting them is a hobby unto itself.
Secret Masters of Fandom: Many years ago, I was a SMoF.
Hucksters' room: a meeting room at a con devoted the vendors selling books and other items of interest to fans.

Ol' Man Keith said...

Baronial Passive Aggressive (the original Regal Threat)

Garth lifted a pewter mug to toast the king.
The furry-faced barons dutifully followed his lead,
but laced their hymn with nuances to sing
notes of scorn along with the royal creed.

They resented a majestic title for Haldane,
a milk-skinned youth—no cold-kill to his name.
~ OMK

Misty said...

Another exciting puzzle morning with terrific offerings in very different and intriguing styles from Owen and Ol' Man Keith. Many thanks to both of you for these inspiring responses to a set of tricky Jumble words.

Misty said...

"Rhyming Crisis"

How to rhyme "furry"
made her blurry with worry.
And she came up with no response
when she tried to rhyme "nuance."
Rhyming "pewter" was a hooter,
and she posted that one on her computer.
Rhyming "title" would have been a treat
but that turned out to be a real defeat.

Okay, she's not one of the great poets
but at least she acknowledges that she knows it.

Ol' Man Keith said...

My younger son is a reporter and reviewer for IGN and covers Comic-Con, Owen, among other fantasy social events--so I've picked up a bit on the kind of convention you cover in today's poem.
Devotees of the different make-believe figures form their own cliques within the larger congregation. Your stanzas give a fair description of the sometimes subtle distinctions among groups.

Ahh, couplets, couplets everywhere!
Misty, please take another look at my poem today. It really is nothing much, not my proudest offering, but look at the simple verse structure--ABAB CC.
I use it a lot. It is a very common scheme.
What it has going for it is how it gets away from the regular thud-thud-thudding of rhyming couplets.

Please, don't tell us you are a lousy poet.
We all know that isn't true, so please don't use it as a cop-out.
~ OMK

Misty said...

Thank you for the suggestion, OMK. I did look at your poem, and will try to keep it in mind as I deal with the rhyming structure in future poems. As you can see from my verse, my problem today was trying to figure out how to create a narrative with the Jumble words, and when nothing worked, I decided I had to make the poem about the difficult of rhyming the words. It thought it worked and that the silly confession at the ending would make it a bit funny.

Ol' Man Keith said...

She sought to rhyme "flurry,"
but came up w/ no response.
She grew blurry with worry
when she tried to rhyme "nuance."

That revision took less than 20 seconds. (Your "...blurry with worry" is neat!)
IMHO, this version has two advantages. (A) It is less obvious, less clomping,
and (B) it lets readers feel smarter as they uncover your rhymes.

Couplets are OK, of course.
Just ask Owen--today, or on many days. Me too; I like couplets.
But when they are unrelieved, constant, (w/ some triplets thrown in), we stop paying attention to content & just feel the steady banging.
Like a loose window shutter on a windy night.

Not to worry: You're on the verge of major breakthroughs.
~ OMK