While cold Northern lakes are all covered with snow
Wordsmiths ruminate as frigid winds blow
And write definitions for those who would know
If a stick with a string is a "rod" or a "pole."

Each term its own meaning they do establish;
A "rod" or a "pole," is... whatever they wish.
That's fine; in that country hard water can't swish.
All winter, down South, we just take it... and fish!

My grandpa's homemade outfits -- 12-foot bamboo poles with homemade guides
and rude, wired-on reels that amounted to not much more than a
line-holders -- were the poliest-looking rods I've ever seen. In the lexicon
of rural Tennessee, "swells" from the city carried "rods" while home folk
used "poles." It's a Southern thang.

Joe
--------------
"RichZ" wrote:

If it ain't got a reel on it, and the line is tied to the end, it's a pole.
Otherwise, it's a rod.

snip