"Mary had a riddle lamb, brain-tease was hard as stone!"
Today Mary's lamb wants you to solve its riddle.
A white man plowing the dark soil
Silent oxen around him toil
A train whistle is near
What's said may disappear
Half hint:
The lamb isn't involved, that's just the name of a series of riddle.
Hint #1:
Caius Titus dixit
Answer
The answer is
CHALK.
A white man plowing the dark soil
Chalk on a blackboard.
Silent oxen around him toil
Silent pupils in a classroom, or students in a lecture hall, toiling to copy down what the chalk is writing on the board. Intended explanation: silent fingers gripping the chalk and toiling to move it.
A train whistle is near
The whistle at the start and end of school sessions. Intended explanation: chalk screeching on a blackboard can sound like a train whistle.
What's said may disappear
The writing on the board (what's 'said' by the chalk) gets rubbed out ('disappears') later. This was also intended to be a reference to the Latin proverb "Verba volant, scripta manent".
I got this by reading the full poem alluded to in the title and hunting for ideas in there.
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