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Limericks
2011-01-13
Recently I started to learn how to write limericks from a limerick-family of which everybody had been at it for years. They got me going by introducing me the book of ‘The Penguin Book of Limericks’….very funny.
I extracted the basic rules of a limerick as following: ‘A limerick is a five-line poem written with one couplet and one triplet. If a couplet is a two-line rhymed poem, then a triplet would be a three-line rhymed poem. The rhyme pattern is a a b b a with lines 1, 2 and 5 containing 3 beats and rhyming, and lines 3 and 4 having two beats and rhyming. Some people say that the limerick was invented by soldiers returning from France to the Irish town of Limerick in the 1700's.
Limericks are meant to be funny. They often contain hyperbole, onomatopoeia, idioms, puns, and other figurative devices. The last line of a good limerick contains the PUNCH LINE or "heart of the joke." As you work with limericks, remember to have pun, I mean FUN! Say the following limericks out loud and clap to the rhythm.’
Here are a few I have tried so far, just to start the ball rolling, and more to come:
There was a lady called Bell,
Appeared on ‘weiwang’ with a sweet smile,
In US, a blind cat met a dead rat,
With one suitcase she came and brought two back,
Has she got the best deal?!
There was a surgeon of Australia,
Could be trained in Inner Mongolia,
He operated on tumour,
Using no scalpel but a spanner,
A surgeon often mixes-up eyebrow with bear.
There was a lady called NO,
N for square, O for hole,
Lives in London speaking English,
Always fancied a Cantonese dish,
NO’s life is never dull.
There was a fellow called Frank,
At the ‘wenxuecheng’, he had a high rank,
One mouse and two keyboards,
He composed music of all sorts,
Nothing sounded like a heavy tank.
There was a young lady of Oregon,
Shooting photos with passion,
Flowers and landscape,
Woods around the lake,
With her, a pistol sounded like a Cannon.
There was a tall man called Timothy,
The lyrics he wrote were very fancy,
Going in and coming out,
Circling like a roundabout,
His efforts were definitely worthy.
There was an old Chinese man of New England,
Retired but full of poetic mind,
A piece out when he opened his mouth,
Over a year, he wrote lots,
An old Chinese man was at his own band.
There was a funny man of Beijing,
Went everywhere with donkey-riding,
An expert in roasting geese,
Made cooking as a hobby of his,
Poor donkey, only carrots for feeding.
There was a young lady called ‘fossil’,
Lived in San Francesco as a non-local,
Scary, worked in city on high voltage,
Rather lived in an country cottage,
Still was a fossil in a castle.
There was a young lady called ‘anonymous little’,
Had a mind of a wonder angel,
Presented Buddha with flowers,
Even though some may be borrowers,
‘Anonymous little’, lovely as a seagull.
There was a Chinese lady Herbal-doctor,
Trained in traditional acupuncture,
One needle and two clay-pots,
Curing pain and releasing body nodes,
The Herbal-doctor was quite a character.
There was a lady called ‘Butterfly’,
Medical career aimed very high,
Had a troop of female soldiers,
All smart and drop-dead gorgeous,
No wonder she was delightful without sigh.
There was a fellow called ‘PRO’,
Joked about himself as very slow,
Once was a consultant with ideas,
Nowadays became the head of mafias
Who said a man was too old to grow?
There was a young lady named ‘Greengrass’,
Grew-up with ‘piano, violin and brass’,
Introduced music with a true taste,
Not simply ‘copy and then paste’,
A lady who enjoyed Classics and Jazz.
There was a follow called ‘Lasting rocks’,
Translating lyrics in his blogs,
From English to Chinese,
Line by line in every piece,
A brilliant skill knocked off all socks.
There was a lassie of Oxford,
Served drinks in truckload,
Looked at the pictures she caught,
Accompanied with stories in her blog,
The ‘Ox-Girl’ had fingers of gold.
There was a young man called ‘Curious’,
Sometimes could be very serious,
Asked one question after another,
Occasionally could be quite a bother,
To Curious, avoided to get furious.
There was a country-teacher of Chinese,
Skilled in making videos with so much ease,
Occasionally showed signs of aging,
Tried to find the pair of glasses she was wearing,
Enjoyed life in full, and worries were the least.
There was a lady called ‘Webseeing’,
Fell forwards and backwards on skiing,
Dropped her camera, and knocked the lens,
Caused her four-limb all dents,
‘No harm done’, she stood up and kept going.
There was a lady called ‘Ordinary Director’,
Converted everyone to actress or actor,
‘Action!’, not for movies, but for parties,
Sounded quite like a general in the armies,
Would understand better if her messages were shorter.
There was a lady called ‘Springstream’,
Searched wrong words using a beam,
Included Chinese and English,
Also Japanese and Turkish,
‘Springstream’ appeared like a gleam.
There was an old Chinese man of Britain,
He held a mysterious profession,
With borrowed time from the God,
Spent it on the Photoshop,
A simple old man, hoped to get a good pension.
There was a lady called ‘Snow on the Chilly River’,
Spoken like a professional broadcaster,
Stories, poems and movie pieces,
Voiced as soft as tender kisses,
This lady could make a frozen soul hotter.
There was a lady singer called ‘Song of Dream’,
Recorded singing in her laundry dorm,
Either sang in a choir or solo,
Sounded sweetly like an angel,
‘Song of Dream’ made flowers to bloom.
There was a gentleman called ‘Eight thousand miles’,
Described his life journey as long as the Niles,
Loved cartoons and motor racing,
Enjoyed architecture and gliding,
An amateur gardener never minded ‘dirty nails’.
More to come........
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