A Special Poem

A limerick is a very short poem that became popular almost two hundred years ago. Experts think that it came from a city in Ireland called Limerick, but the exact origin is unknown. It is usually a funny, playful poem that should be easy to remember and easy to write.

Edward Lear (1812-1888) was one of the first people to make the Limerick popular. People of the time laughed at the funny little verse mainly because people thought limericks were absurd. At that time poems were usually long, literary works of art about serious topics but Edward Lear’s poems were short and a little bit ridiculous. Here is an example from Edward Lear:

1. There was an Old Person of Dover,                       A

2. Who rushed through a field of blue Clover;     A

3. But some very large bees,                                      B

4. Stung his nose and his knees,                               B

5. So he very soon went back to Dover.                 A

A limerick only has five lines. The first line traditionally introduces a person and a place. The first, second and fifth lines rhyme and usually have about eight or nine syllables. In Lear’s example, ‘Dover’, ‘Clover’, and ‘Dover’ rhyme (A). The third and fourth lines also rhyme but are a little shorter and normally contain five or six syllables. In our example, ‘bees’ and ‘knees’ rhyme (B). In early limericks, the last line was often a copy of the first line, but nowadays it is usually different. The best limericks will often include a surprise or twist in the last line which makes the limerick funny and more memorable.