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Twenty two words hold P second and O third, and a doubled O runs through a third of them.
SPOOF, SPOOK, SPOOL, SPOOM, SPOON, SPOOR and SPOOT all run SPOO and change only the last letter. O takes the fourth box in eight of the twenty two.
They differ in one box and nothing else, so landing on the shape narrows the word without naming it. SPOON and SPOOL are the two a puzzle is most likely to want.
S takes fifteen of the twenty two, with E on four and A on three. Only three letters appear in that box at all.
Both are ordinary modern vocabulary and neither has anything to do with the SPO shape. EPODE, a form of lyric poem, and EPOPT, an initiate of ancient mysteries, fill out the E side.
APODS, APOOP and APORT are the A openers, and all three are specialist. So the useful non S words come down to EPOXY and EPOCH.
T closes five of the twenty two and E closes four, with twelve letters appearing in the last box.
Eight of the twenty two carry a repeated letter, and the SPOO cluster accounts for nearly all of them.
EPOXY tests the E, X and Y, none of which the SPO branch uses. SPORT sits inside the busiest opening and rules out less.
To run before the wind with sails lowered, a nautical verb. It sits in the SPOO cluster alongside SPOOR and SPOOT.
Towards the port side of a ship. It belongs with the older a words like afoot and afore.