Limericks

Limericks are, in short, 5-lined poems. It must always be written in exactly the same way - 5 lines and two rhymes. The first, second and fifth lines rhyme, and the third and fourth lines must rhyme, too.

Limericks, unlike other forms of poems, are not too popular with literature readers and, thus, not many people, especially the younger generations, know anything about limericks. But do they know that when they were young and in their nurseries, one of the first rhymes most of us ever learn is a perfect limerick. I'm talking about :

Hickory, dickory, dock!
The mouse ran up the clock.
The clock struck one -
The mouse ran down.
Hickory, dickory, dock!

One of my personal favourite limericks runs like this:

A dozen, a gross, and a score,
Plus three times the square root of four,
If divided by seven,
Plus five times eleven,
Yields nine squared and not a bit more.

Try this mathematical limerick out, you'll get 12+144+20+(3x2) = 182; 182/7 = 26; 26 + (5x11)=81. And 81 is of course equal to nine to the power of two.

Limericks are simple, and yet they can be funny, serious, nonsensical, silly and erotic! In limericks, one will encounter peoples of all nations often caught in ribald and bawdy situations. Some of my erotic limericks would go like:

There was a young girl in Berlin
Who was fucked by an elderly Finn.
Though he did his best,
And fucked her with zest,
She kept asking, "Hey, Pop, is it in?"

A young woman got married at Chester,
Her mother she kissed and she blessed her.
Says she, "you're in luck,
He's a stunning good fuck,
For I've had him myself down in Leicester."

There was a young lady of Exeter,
So pretty, that men craned their necks at her.
One was even so brave
As to take out and wave
The distinguishing mark of his sex at her.

There was a young girl from Hong Kong
Who said, "You are utterly wrong
To say my virgina
Is the largest in China,
Just because of your mean little dong."

Some of the above classic limericks in erotic stanza written in the 40s, were considered shocking in theme and langguage at the time. But they were definitely more enlightening (in my opinion, of course) than those literature poetries forced down our throats in school by our teachers.

I would sometimes make up a few limericks for fun just to tease my friends and I hope you'll be inspired to make up one of your own, too.