Limerick
The limerick predates 1719, when it appeared in Songs for the Nursery, or Mother Goose’s Melodies for Children. Children’s writer Edward Lear (1812-88) is widely credited with popularizing the form; his habit of finishing his limericks with a near-verbatim repetition of the first line isn’t much in favor currently.
While the limerick has maintained strong ties with children’s verse, it has shown an equally strong affinity for bawdy humor.
Abbreviations, odd spellings, and other tricks are frequent devices.
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by Norman W. Storer
A limerick, sketched in the rough,
Should undergo testing that's tough:
Does it scan as it ought?
Are the rhymes finely wrought?--
And is it offensive enough?
Who was sadly pursued by a bear;
When she found she was tired,
She abruptly expired,
That unfortunate Lady of Clare.
--Edward Lear
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There once was a dancing black bear Who, instead of a hat, wore a pair Of shoes on his head. "It's a two-step," he said, And it feels like I'm walking on air." --J. Patrick Lewis |
The Vulture by C.W. Christian The vulture's a grim apparition With appetite gross! In addition His manners are crummy, And if he gets chummy Please check with your family physician. |
by G.J. Frahm
Now consider the case of young Cotton:
such perfectionist notions he'd gotten
that, doubting he could
be sufficiently good,
he's resolved to be
perfectly rotten.
Who said, "Although pain isn't real,
If I sit on a pin
And it punctures my skin,
I dislike what I fancy I feel."
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There was a young fellow of Lyme,
Who lived with three wives at one time.
When asked, "Why the third?"
He replied, "One's absurd,
And bigamy, sir, is a crime."
The sermon our Pastor Rt. Rev.
Began, may have had a rt. clev.,
But his talk, though consistent
Kept the end so far distant
That we left since we felt he mt. nev.
[There was a young Lady of Clare] from The Complete Nonsense
Book by Edward Lear;
"Criteria" © 1999 Norman W. Storer, from Light Quarterly;
[There once was a dancing black bear] © 1991 J. Patrick
Lewis, from Lots of Limericks, selected by Myra Cohn Livingston;
"The Vulture" © 2000 C.W. Christian, from Light Quarterly;
"Young Cotton" © 2002 G.J. Frahm, from Plains Songs;
anonymous limericks
from: Lots of Limericks, edited by Louis Untermeyer; Laughable
Limericks, compiled by Sara and John E. Brewton;
and The
Penguin Book of Limericks, compiled and edited by E.O. Parrott