Introduction
The most famous writer of limericks was
Edward Lear,
an artist and writer of nonsense, now most famous for poems like The
Owl and the Pussy Cat and The Yonghi Bonghy Bó.
There are two types of
limerick. The first of
them, favoured by Lear, repeats the rhyme word of the first line as the
rhyme word of the last. The other, which is probably more
difficult, and which is better known now, finds a new word for the end
of the last line. This is the kind I prefer, and I sometimes
add
internal rhymes to the last line, and sometimes link several limericks
together in a mini-story.
Some time ago teachers of English seemed
obsessed
with using the haiku as an introduction to English verse.
That
was nonsense. English verse is based on a regular pattern of
stressed and unstressed syllables, while the haiku is a Japanese verse
form and Japanese does not distinguish stressed and unstressed
syllables. Far from being a suitable introduction to English
verse, the haiku is mere syllable-counting. As an easy verse
form
these deluded teachers could more appropriately have chosen the
limerick.
Each foot of the line contains one
stressed syllable
preceded by one or two unstressed syllables: ti-TUM or
ti-ti-TUM.
The first two line each have three feet, the next two have two feet and
the final line three feet.
Limericks
How
pleasant to know Mr Lear
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought that he ought to
try drinking some water.
It just made his life dark and drear.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought lemonade
might just make the grade.
It didn’t get anywhere near.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought perhaps wine
might make him feel fine.
It didn’t. at least so I hear.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought that some sherry
might make him more merry.
It didn’t at all, dear oh dear.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought perhaps brandy
would make him feel dandy.
It made him feel dizzy I fear.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
He thought maybe whisky
would make him feel frisky.
It just made his head feel quite queer.
How pleasant to know Mr Lear,
a man who drinks nothing but beer.
Stout, lager and ale
keep him hearty and hale
and full of the best of good cheer.
Animals
There once was an elderly cow
who made friends with a flipperty sow.
The cow danced a jig,
and so did the pig.
I really can’t understand how.
There once was an Indian goat
who wore an inflatable coat.
When she and her daughter
fell into the water
the coat was what kept them afloat.
There was a bold sparrow from Harrow,
who liked to fly straight as an arrow.
He set off one day
to fly a long way,
and travelled from Harrow to Jarrow.
There once was an elderly pig,
who wore an extremely fine wig,
and on hearing the band
thought music was grand,
so the pig in the wig danced a jig.
A lady once went on a search
when her parrot had flown from its perch,
but she needn’t have feared,
for he’d not disappeared.
He’d found a new perch in the church.
The vicar, an old man called Hermann,
was giving a long boring sermon.
The parrot was bored
to hear how he jawed,
and translated it all into German.
A German whose name was Hans Krantz
sat down on a mound full of ants.
He leapt up with a cry,
and I think you know why:
Hans Krantz had got ants in his pants.
People
There was a young schoolboy from Thame
who invented a wonderful game.
He thought it would make
him well-known – a mistake:
we don’t even remember his name
A tourist who travelled to Rome
took a bus to the Pantheon Dome,
but she started to sneeze,
then fell on her knees,
and was kicked from behind by a gnome.
This young lady tourist in Rome
next found herself covered in foam.
After that, if you please,
she was stung by some bees,
and wished she were safe back at home.
There was a young lady, quite French,
who made up her bed in a trench,
but she got quite a fright,
when there came in the night
a disgustingly horrible stench.
There once was an upstanding youth
who tried to speak nothing but truth,
but the people who heard
his unvarnished word
just thought he was rather uncouth.
There was a young lady whose hair
was exceedingly curly and fair,
till she washed it one day
and it all came away
and left her scalp bare to the air.
I think you will find it is true,
there’s just one kind of shampoo
that makes hair fall out.
Now there’s never a doubt:
she’s no need of shampoo. She needs glue.
A man, who was hit on the cranium
by a falling potted geranium,
might perhaps have been sad,
but he said, “I am glad
that it wasn’t a block of titanium.”
Builders who want an extension
are subject to terrible tension,
for the rules of the game
are rarely the same,
and often beyond comprehension.
A prophet expounding his vision
was subjected to mocking derision.
It was not as he thought,
in fact he’d been caught
out in colossal misprision.
A woman who wanted to act
once made with the Devil a pact
that she’d sell him her soul
for a big leading role
and applause for a house that was packed.
That put her ahead of the game
and guaranteed thespian fame.
She did very well,
but she went down to Hell,
and nobody else was to blame.
A young bodhisattva would jest,
“If ever I’m really depressed,
I will take a quick trip,
to Hungary skip,
and be known as the Buddha of Pest.”
An elderly lady called Jane
one day got a terrible pain,
so she said, “I’ll begin
with a little more gin.
I really don’t want to complain.”
There was an old lady called Joan
who broke all her teeth on a bone.
She said, “Now look, chum,
I’ll eat with my gum,
if the dentist will leave me alone.
There once was a gardener who grew
many flowers, and all of them blue,
none yellow or red.
To objector he said,
“It’s true I like blue, why don’t
you?”
Another keen gardening fellow
Grew flowers in all shades of yellow.
When people then said,
“Why not purple or red?”
“I LIKE YELLOW!” this fellow would bellow.
There was an old man of Carlisle
who thought writing poetry vile.
Though he tried all the time
he never could rhyme.
He missed every rhyme by a kilometre.
There was a proud lady, and tact
was something she totally lacked.
She hissed and she booed,
and they all thought her rude
as she sneered and she jeered and she quacked.
To a woman who’d broken her arm
people said, “Use a magical charm.
Try using a spell
to make it get well.
It really can’t do any harm.”
She replied, “The Lord God has decreed
making spells is a terrible deed.
You should get down and pray
on your knees every day
if healing with speed’s what you need.”
A doctor whose name was Amelia
said, “I really just have to feel ya,
and prod at your chest
to decide on the best
thing I should do now to heal ya.”
A man who had bought a Rolls Royce,
the aristocrats’ car of choice,
drove into a tree,
so he said, “Oh dear me,”
in a very refined little voice.
“You bleat like a soppy wee girl!”
shouted the son of an earl.
“You should swear like a trooper!
You’d find it quite super
to make people’s toes start to curl”
A man who was rather bombastic
Developed a hatred of plastic.
He’d destroy the whole lot
if ever her got
the chance, although that’s rather drastic.
There was an old lady from Brum
who went on a trip with her chum.
When he fell down a well
she remarked “Damn and Hell!
I told him he shouldn’t have come.
There once was a subterranean
creature, a sort of Albanian,
who shouted and screamed
so that it seemed
quite right to call him a zany un.
Rebecca, who calls herself “Becks”,
gets all her news just from X.
She believes every word
however absurd.
No ornament she to her sex.
Historian Matthew ... um ... Dennison
likes to eat lots of hot venison
with pepper and mace,
but first he says grace,
a truly worshipful benison
A Prime Minister who was called Starmer
had no time for the life of a farmer.
He thought it was grand
to tax all their land,
so they didn’t think he was a charmer.
An old man who was eighty-two
took his grandchildren out to the zoo.
They saw all the apes
who were playing their japes,
and the monkeys were playing tricks too.
A traveller going to Spain
found he had missed the right train.
He felt rather vexed,
so he boarded the next,
and never was heard of again.
An Auksford professor
An Auksford professor called James
was expert in knowing the names
of all kinds of things,
from pigeons and rings
to warthogs, computers and games.
He knew everything that was known
about oceans and monkeys and stone.
When he heard people cry,
“We can prophecy!”
he gave an incredulous groan.
He said, “It is axiomatic
that utterances claimed to be vatic
don’t move us at all.
In fact, like this wall,
they just leave us totally static.”
He marked up a thesis in red,
and then he regretfully said,
“The writer began
quite well, then he ran
crazy and went off his head.
“I think he won’t get a degree,
well not if it’s left up to me.
It’s really quite sad,
for he’s totally mad.
He’s cackling with glee in a tree.”
