Poems

[cinelli]

Take a fragment of a poem

Mary had a little lamb,
Its fleece was white as snow

and write each word, one to a line and left-justified:

MARY
HAD
A
LITTLE
LAMB
ITS
FLEECE
WAS
WHITE
AS
SNOW

Encode the poem by going down all the first letters, then all the second, and so on, skipping over spaces, like

MHALLIFWWASAAIATLAHSNRDTMSESIOYTBETWLCEEE

What are the three poems which have been encoded to give

1) OADATDLWMIEMNALHAOHOSVAYAEYVONEYCESTRKEH

2) IMGDTTSATTLSATSUOOOHEGOHOENHKSWEAAENASEYTNSIENLY

3) TINFLABTTULAHSORIOOASAWEIKOKNARGEKEDYEASTE ?

Cinelli

[Rover110]

Spoiler
I rigged up a spreadsheet to extract i+j, 2i+j, 3i+j from a string.
When I found word-start-looking values for a given i, I felt I had enough to guess the first few words. And then google gave me the first line or two of the first couple of problems.

Bartholemew Griffin
On a day, alack the day!
Love, whose month was ever May,

Sea Fever John Masefield
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky

[UncleEbenezer]

2) IMGDTTSATTLSATSUOOOHEGOHOENHKSWEAAENASEYTNSIENLY

ITYM 2) IMGDTTSATTLSATSUOOOHEGOHOENHKSWEAAENASDEYTNSIENLY

Ashamed to say, that was the only one of the three I recognised. The Shakespeare and Dickinson were both completely unfamiliar, and the latter doesn't even bloomin' parse to anything that makes sense in my mind!

OK, a love poem in iambic pentameter, likely to be best-known to mathematicians:

CLUHTAHPWDTTFFOVOESAOILHYRHAIFEMTSGAEAEEIENETHNRDARLNEEEESDYDNRS

[UncleEbenezer]

2) IMGDTTSATTLSATSUOOOHEGOHOENHKSWEAAENASEYTNSIENLY

ITYM 2) IMGDTTSATTLSATSUOOOHEGOHOENHKSWEAAENASDEYTNSIENLY

Ashamed to say, that was the only one of the three I recognised. The Shakespeare and Dickinson were both completely unfamiliar, and the latter doesn't even bloomin' parse to anything that makes sense in my mind!

OK, a love poem in iambic pentameter, likely to be best-known to mathematicians:

CLUHTAHPWDTTFFOVOESAOILHYRHAIFEMTSGAEAEEIENETHNRDARLNEEEESDYDNRS

And the first poem I ever set to music, more than half a lifetime ago ...

TOATPWTSIABPGBHWNHUEOENEEROELDESNAAAEASTUETYTNCIAFTUL

[edit to say] That's excluding poems I set to music in music classes at school, which happened to include Spike Milligan's version of the Masefield.

[cinelli]

Thank you, UncleEbenezer, for the two extra challenges. I struggled for some time over CLUH... but this eventually led me to an author of whom Wikipedia reports the opinion that, in 1976, was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world. TOATP... was much easier.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

Thank you, UncleEbenezer, for the two extra challenges.

It's the kind of thread that could run and run if people like it enough to post examples.

TRGEOAOBTTDWIBHOOVNNNAOHOHTEEAEEDCEOEGDSRKRRAEN

[cinelli]

It's the kind of thread that could run and run if people like it enough to post examples.

TRGEOAOBTTDWIBHOOVNNNAOHOHTEEAEEDCEOEGDSRKRRAEN

The road goes ever on and on
Back to the door where it began

I believe this is by Tolkien. Here are four more examples. Number one is abridged but it is topical.

1) NSNMNMNNNDNDNPTODNOUOOOOOOOAOUORIFAONOROWSOMYVNNNNKPEEEMRBER

2) WZKPHCWACTHTAHDRFIAIOAAIAHEWRIIIILNLOTRTNAIOSANNLTLRTRHETRUMGGIZEIOLNOEAIDELEDNR
MNLDDGER

3) NWIWAYMICMPAILTFLOAROHAOAAEANIHRIFOWESUNRCDVEEFVNNRKEEEEGIDRED

4) IWNWICTTTCITSOLAIHAOOHATHUFOSNEMWELEMVENENYLMETEEEDREN

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

Here are four more examples. Number one is abridged but it is topical.

Hey! Steady on! Four all at once seems a bit harsh, and none of them familiar. Especially when TLF swallows my reply, by logging me out between hitting "reply" and trying to submit.

1) NSNMNMNNNDNDNPTODNOUOOOOOOOAOUORIFAONOROWSOMYVNNNNKPEEEMRBER

Topical? ITYM Seasonal!

2) WZKPHCWACTHTAHDRFIAIOAAIAHEWRIIIILNLOTRTNAIOSANNLTLRTRHETRUMGGIZEIOLNOEAIDELEDNRMNLDDGER

Struggling. Should be easy with all those unusual letters. I can get up to a row of fourth letters that kind-of work using the green portion, but then it breaks down: nowhere for that second Z, for instance. And I can't find any clues in google.

3) NWIWAYMICMPAILTFLOAROHAOAAEANIHRIFOWESUNRCDVEEFVNNRKEEEEGIDRED

Can't find a poem, but google finds a song, which references a famous aussie song.

4) IWNWICTTTCITSOLAIHAOOHATHUFOSNEMWELEMVENENYLMETEEEDREN

Another that looks like a song rather than a poem. Looks like the heart of hippydom - or perhaps more likely a wannabe.

Ok, one more:

IMATFAALWSTVATLOSERRNNAHAWANREFTTAOTNOIOSDUGOVMIDDTNSNEQKELULLEEESRS

[cinelli]

Ok, one more:

IMATFAALWSTVATLOSERRNNAHAWANREFTTAOTNOIOSDUGOVMIDDTNSNEQKELULLEEESRS

Reply to IMATF...

I thought I had a method for solving these but I struggled with this one. I had to come back to it a couple of times. What makes these hard is the inclusion of uncommon words, like dyads and trunkless. Eventually I came up with

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

which the beginning of a sonnet by Shelley. This is improving my literary knowledge. Thank you, UncleEbenezer.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

2) WZKPHCWACTHTAHDRFIAIOAAIAHEWRIIIILNLOTRTNAIOSANNLTLRTRHETRUMGGIZEIOLNOEAIDELEDNRMNLDDGER

Struggling. Should be easy with all those unusual letters. I can get up to a row of fourth letters that kind-of work using the green portion, but then it breaks down: nowhere for that second Z, for instance. And I can't find any clues in google.

Still makes no sense.
If the second, fifth and sixth words are proper but unconventional names, and guessing how they might continue draws a blank with google, that makes it hard to reconcile stray letters like those ZEIO between the first name and what almost works as "twirled around". And google still draws a blank if I feed it what appear to be emerging as the eleven last words after those proper names!

And now for something (im)proper traditional ...
TWAMTODASMNGFTPHAAHTANHUEOOOLASIIHYDESERATDETDTYRSH

[UncleEbenezer]

And now for something (im)proper traditional ...
TWAMTODASMNGFTPHAAHTANHUEOOOLASIIHYDESERATDETDTYRSH

Buggrit, missing a letter there:

TWAMTODASMNGFTPHAAHTANHUEOOOLASIIHYDESERATDSETDTYRSH

[cinelli]

Still makes no sense.

Hints
You are very close. "Twirled around" is correct.
The author is a Nobel laureate.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

Still makes no sense.

Hints
You are very close. "Twirled around" is correct.
The author is a Nobel laureate.

Cinelli

Well, that first proper name would appear to start "Zant". Which looks like a ghastly illiterate Americanism, yesno? Is there also some corruption of English into street slang that might account for that second Z?

And if it's a poem anyone's heard of, why doesn't google find a match for "that he twirled around his diamond ring finger"?

[cinelli]

And if it's a poem anyone's heard of, why doesn't google find a match for "that he twirled around his diamond ring finger"?

This is odd because when I do the same search, I am directed to a relevant website. Have another go.

Cinelli

[cinelli]

TWAMTODASMNGFTPHAAHTANHUEOOOLASIIHYDESERATDSETDTYRSH

Reply:

Yes, cracked this one:

That was a maid this other day,
And she must needs go forth to play

These are the first two lines of a lengthy English folk song named Watkins Ale. There is a rendition of this song on YouTube.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

And if it's a poem anyone's heard of, why doesn't google find a match for "that he twirled around his diamond ring finger"?

This is odd because when I do the same search, I am directed to a relevant website. Have another go.

Cinelli

Nope. Google no doubt knows your tastes, hence taking you there.

However, some major adjustment in expectations got me there. The key was the observation that the somewhat-poetic question "will Zant???? kill poor ..." wasn't. The letters fit a totally unpoetic start "William Zant" (surely more befitting a news report than a poem), which google found for me.

So it turns out the "Nobel Laureate" - hippydom's most total s**t - was the perfect illustration that it's not *just* the "peace prize" that can be a sick joke. And the "poem" turns out to be a piece of ugly hate speech (albeit probably well-deserved) from someone monumentally oblivious to the irony of calling out a man's abuse of a woman after his own treatment of Joan Baez.

Anything featuring proper names is likely to be problematic. Unless perhaps a classical name: my first thought was that Zant might be from the root Xanthe, though the later words belied the notion that she might kill poor anyone for unrequited love.

Anyway, having vented about that, one more for you. No proper names, of course, but I hope it'll prove a worthy challenge.

WTAWHSSTDOMHPTTRHHPIIHOHRFAAEOHOAARTSOOEORTREONTIHUTGCHCTLREHHEELETDESE

[cinelli]

Anyway, having vented about that, one more for you. No proper names, of course, but I hope it'll prove a worthy challenge.

WTAWHSSTDOMHPTTRHHPIIHOHRFAAEOHOAARTSOOEORTREONTIHUTGCHCTLREHHEELETDESE

I am going to have a go at this without having done any Googliing research. This is like doing a jigsaw puzzle without looking at the picture.

Whan that April with his shoure sootel
The drog of March hath perched
To the rootetese.

I am supposing that this is old English, possibly Chaucer. Some words I recognise, some not.
Whan = when?
shoure = shower?
drog = drought?
But, supposing they are correct, "sootel" and "rootetese" remain a mystery, as does "perched" in this context.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

I am supposing that this is old English, possibly Chaucer. Some words I recognise, some not.

Cinelli

Correct author - well done. Partially incorrect words: they're actually rather more familiar than yours.

[cinelli]

This is interesting. I have now done a little research. My mistake in solving UncleEbenezer’s puzzle was assigning a letter to the wrong word. Once you have done that, things get out of hand and you are left with sundry extra letters which have to be tacked on to the end of the longest word. So it is Aprille, not April. You would think that Chaucer knew how to spell, wouldn't you? I had wondered whether Aprille was pronounced with three syllables, but apparently not. There are websites which give a spoken version of the text.

Also I hadn’t appreciated that the two lines rhymed, namely soote and roote. I wonder how soote, two syllables, became sweet.

Cinelli

[UncleEbenezer]

This is interesting. I have now done a little research. My mistake in solving UncleEbenezer’s puzzle was assigning a letter to the wrong word. Once you have done that, things get out of hand and you are left with sundry extra letters which have to be tacked on to the end of the longest word. So it is Aprille, not April. You would think that Chaucer knew how to spell, wouldn't you? I had wondered whether Aprille was pronounced with three syllables, but apparently not. There are websites which give a spoken version of the text.

Also I hadn’t appreciated that the two lines rhymed, namely soote and roote. I wonder how soote, two syllables, became sweet.

Cinelli

Well done. I wondered how you'd cope with old spellings, but you took the clue from the very first word.

I'd contemplated Beowulf, but thought that was a step too far: I wouldn't try to read the original of that myself. Anyway, I think you and I have perhaps now played out this game, unless someone else joins us.