ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

Further to Neville's suggestion about making a coherent poem out of a collection of limericks, I have expanded one of my previously posted efforts...

A blushing young bride named Narelle
had the mother-in-law straight from hell
who caused great alarm
when she rented the farm
to a banker who came from Sawtell

The banker, whose hair was jet black,
thought farming would be such a snack,
but found to his pain
without follow-up rain
crops germinate then they die back.

The banker thought farming with goats
would simply mean shearing their coats.
When he came to his senses
they'd ruined his fences;
he said "I'll go sow my wild oats".

Very good Robyn

You could even expand on that, I agree the limerick has a great rhyming structure.

It's a great learning tool as well. I did a session with the school kids last year on the limerick and I found it a great tool to get across the basics of rhyme and metre and to promote the fun side of poetry.

a couple I wasn't clever enough to write myself

There was a young girl from Rabat
who had triplets - Nat, Tat and Pat
Twas fun in the breeding
but not in the feeding
She found she had no tit for Tat.

A young schitzophrenic named Struther
was shocked by the death of his brother.
He said "It sounds bad"
"But I'm not real sad"
"I'm lucky I've still got each other"

Marty

Thanks Marty,
yes I agree limericks are a great way to introduce kids to poetry. Easy, fun, and a quick way to a sense of achievement... for grown-ups too!
Cheers
Robyn

Great work Robyn.


Are you saying they are not yours Marty ? If not, I sense that you had a hand in their production anyway

G'day Neville,

perhaps a lesson in the exact syllable count etc for a limerick would be in order. (?)

Mind you I think most of us have it right. Though I have often seen people torturing the form by adding extra bits in the middle lines. (Ho ho, ha ha .. I almost said "muddling the middle". )

Zondrae, I think Maureen gave a sample of the limerick syllable count in her weekly homework post and I think there is flexibility in the metre of limericks, they are meant to be a bit frivolous.

Here you go....

AABBA
A limerick is a five-line poem with a strict form (AABBA), originally popularized in English by Edward Lear, which intends to be witty or humorous, and is sometimes obscene with humorous intent.
8/9 A
8/9 A
5/6 B
5/6 B
8/9 A


The standard form of a limerick is a stanza of five lines, with the first, second and fifth having eight or nine syllables and rhyming with one another, and the third and fourth having five or six and rhyming separately. Lines are usually written in the anapaestic meter, but can also be amphibrachic.

The first line traditionally introduces a person and a place, with the place appearing at the end of the first line and establishing the rhyme scheme for the second and fifth lines. In early limericks, the last line was often essentially a repeat of the first line, although this is no longer customary.

Within the genre, ordinary speech stress is often distorted in the first line, and may be regarded as a feature of the form: "There was a young man from the coast;" "There once was a girl from Detroit…" Legman takes this as a convention whereby prosody is violated simultaneously with propriety.[2] Exploitation of geographical names, especially exotic ones, is also common, and has been seen as invoking memories of geography lessons in order to subvert the decorum taught in the schoolroom; Legman finds that the exchange of limericks is almost exclusive to comparatively well-educated males, women figuring in limericks almost exclusively as "villains or victims". The most prized limericks incorporate a kind of twist, which may be revealed in the final line or lie in the way the rhymes are often intentionally tortured, or both. Many limericks show some form of internal rhyme, alliteration or assonance, or some element of word play.

Thanks Heather,

that is very clear.

Now Zondrae, naughty thing...smack. smack. Syllables schmyllables, it's the humorous quirkiness that really counts. The form is flexible.