Limerick
Limericks are little, five-line poems that are quite hard to compose and pop up in all sorts of places. Traditionally, they have been ‘funny’ poems that are usually full of silly phrases or ideas. There is a certain rhyming scheme that they follow - lines one, two, and five rhyme, and lines three and four rhyme. Also, the length and flow of lines one, two, and five are the same, as are the length and flow of lines three and four. Here is an example of a famous limerick:
There was an old man of Nantucket,
who kept all his cash in a bucket;
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man,
And as for the bucket - Nantucket
Full on nonsense, as you can see, but when you read it aloud, the way it flows is quite elegant. Coming up with limericks which sound this good is quite a challenge.
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