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I'm not a chess piece


plasmid
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As we face off, the white and black

I stand beside my twin

See sunbeams fall through patterned cracks

That lie above this den

Of diamond, sir, my heart's composed

It makes me who I am

Across that heart I keep exposed

The mark of Superman

If in the end our paths should meet

Then head o'er heels let's go

Should safeguards fail, there's no retreat

As I bring forth the snow

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It's been a long time since I last posted a riddle, and since most of the people have changed I should probably explain my peculiarly.

I write riddles in such a way that they sound kind of like they're describing one thing, but are actually describing something else completely unrelated, and title them "I'm not a..." whatever the distraction thing is.

In this case, the answer has absolutely nothing to do with anything even close to a chess piece.

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Heya Plasmid. No guess yet, just wanted to say hi.

a pawn

:)

Hi DD, nice to see a familiar face in the riddles section. No pwnage on this one, I'm genuinely staying away from anything having to do with chess.

the snow queen

I'm afraid I've never read The Snow Queen before and had to Wikipedia it to see what it's about. (So obviously it's not the answer I had in mind.) Perhaps Kay and Gerda could represent the twins in the riddle, and the shattered mirror could be the riddle's diamond in the heart. But there are other clues like the sunbeam through the cracks and Superman reference where I can't see an analogy with the story, at least based on what I could find readily.

a cloud....???

hi plasmid..... :D

cool riddle..... :thumbsup::D

Hi EDM, and thanks! That answer works really well for the first stanza and a half, but the Superman clue is an important one to be incorporated into the answer, and the bit about going head over heels is also a reference to an aspect of the answer.

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the yin and the yang....??? or day and night....???

if the answer is the name of a comic character, then I got nothing......:wacko:

It isn't anything esoteric, I always make my riddles about something that >99% of people know about and will recognize. And they're almost always about a concrete object unless I say otherwise. It seems like those tend to make for the most satisfying, slap-your-head-when-you've-got-it type of riddles.

The yin-yang symbol has a lot going for it, but leaves open the clues about sunbeams through the cracks and about the snow.

hey plasmid - great to see you, and a riddle to boot! I'm not a confident riddle guesser yet but...

magnets?

still working on a verse worthy response.

Hi plainglazed, nice to see that a lot of the old crew is still around. Not a magnet, the clues about sunbeams and diamond would still be hanging. But this one ought to be enough of an "OMG that's got to be it" riddle that whoever solves it will know that it's their chance to give a poetic response unraveling the clues and giving the answer.

Television, or computer screen?

Thanks, hambone. A TV/monitor really fits well with a lot of the clues, especially the sunbeams and the snow (back in the analog days) that have been pretty elusive so far. But the twin in line 2 and the part about going head over heels are left open.

WARNING: Funny answer! :lol:

Peter Pan and his shadow... I just don't know how he brings the snow? I couldn't fit him in in that part of the riddle

:)

He he, sounds like you have a little one around, or else a very vivid memory. I vaguely remember that little skirmish. As your hunch suggests though, I can't find any way that he'd fit with the snow clue.

Does this require a lot of prior knowledge?

Nope, no specialized knowledge required for this one. Anyone ought to be able to come up with the answer, and if they're given the answer then they should definitely be able to go back over the riddle and read it couplet-by-couplet and recognize what each of the clues is referring to without needing much if any further explanation.

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Two trees. Probably tall ones. Maybe in a forest, but I don't see how that could be important.

Not a pair of trees, there aren't any famous white-and-black combos that I know of for the opening clue

A Soccer ball?

Neither a soccer ball. I'd like to have seen more bicycle kicks in the world cup for the head-over-heel clue, but it has no heart of diamond

OK, another try...

A photo and it's negative.

P.S. I don't have a kid, but I watched a lot of cartoons as a kid, hence my English knowledge :D

That's a really good answer. It fits the first stanza perfectly. The head-over-heels could refer to image inversion when a picture's taken, and snow if safeguards fail might be a completely white film or maybe blurry image if the process is fouled up. The diamond could refer to an enlarging lens used in the film-to-paper exposure process. If there's a good way that it could fit the clue about the mark of Superman I'd call it an acceptable alternate answer, completely unrelated to what I have in mind.

a suit....???

It gets some of the clues, but leaves things like sunbeams and diamonds unexplained. Unless you mean a suit of cards which would explain the diamonds, but would call for red and black instead of white and black.

avalanche

Definitely fits the last stanza, but I'm not sure what the black part of the white and black clue would be or how it would refer to twins.

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A saltshaker

dms nailed this one. Always a good sign when other people see the answer and say "that's just got to be it". And it's also a little bit humorous that plainglazed and I simultaneously came up with riddles on almost the exact same thing but couldn't figure each other's out.

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THAT'S IT! :lol: That's what I said when I read dms's solution.

The riddle is awesome and beautifully worded :D

BUT what's with the Superman?! :lol:

edit

I think Plasmid was referring to the big S on Superman's chest. And many salt shakers will also have an S on the outside to help distinguish the salt shaker from an identical pepper shaker/mill.

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I think Plasmid was referring to the big S on Superman's chest. And many salt shakers will also have an S on the outside to help distinguish the salt shaker from an identical pepper shaker/mill.

I figured that he meant the S on Superman's chest, but I have never seen a saltshaker in Serbia with an S on it. In Serbian SALT is SO, so they do start with the same letter, as for PEPPER we call it BIBER. :)

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