POETRY TRICK: The Limerick
Tamera WIll WissingerFor the final week of my National Poetry Month/Poetry Friday essays on poetic forms, I’m talking about limericks.
LIMERICKS
Limericks are fascinating to me; they are a lot of fun to read and can be confounding to write. Nobody knows for sure where or how the limerick originated, but when I was writing The Poet's Tackle Box portion of Gone Fishing, I came across an interesting detail about this form from Burges Johnson in The New Rhyming Dictionary and Poet’s Handbook, 2nd ed. (New York: Quill/HarperResource, 2001), 37. According to Johnson, the limerick may have had an exciting start: One legend suggests that between battles, fifteenth-century Irish soldiers would recite poems about their comrades and then everyone would sing, “When we get back to Limerick town ‘twill be a glorious morning.”
The limerick is a brief, humorous poem with five total lines (a cinquain stanza) that follows the anapest rhythm of two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable. The first, second and fifth lines have three sets of anapests and rhyme with each other. (Anapestic trimeters.) Lines three and four have two sets of anapests and rhyme with each other. (Anapestic dimeters.) On April 7 I shared a limerick called “The Judge of Fudge” with Greg Pincus for his 30 poets/30 Days.
This week, in following my month-long inspiration from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, I’ve written a poem that defines the poetic form. Here is my limerick of a limerick:
The Limerick: Poetry’s Trick
Is the limerick poetry’s trick?
With three anapest lines - each a stick,
Then two lines stubby short,
It's a puzzle to sort!
Let’s escape from this limerick – QUICK!
© 2013 Tamera Will Wissinger
TRY WRITING A LIMERICK
The limerick looks simple but it’s kind of a tricky form because it has such a specific rhythm and rhyme pattern. Here are a few tips for writing a limerick:
- Choose a humorous topic, something that you can joke about.
- Jot down strong rhyming words that have to do with your topic. The rhyme scheme is A A B B A
- Pay attention to the rhythm of the words you choose. The basic rhythm pattern goes like this:
da da DUM, da da DUM, da da DUM
da da DUM, da da DUM, da da DUM
da da DUM, da da DUM
da da DUM, da da DUM
da da DUM, da da DUM, da da DUM
(Here are a couple of variations to the first, second, or fifth line: DA da DUM, da da DUM, da da DUM, or da DUM, da da DUM, da da DUM. It’s okay to vary as long as the reader can pick up the anapestic rhythm in the first line.)
- Narrow down to the most descriptive words, and the best rhyming words. Work with the words to find intriguing ways to say what you want to say, but that fit the rhyme and rhythm pattern.
- In a way, when you're writing a limerick you’re telling a joke, so think of the last line as the “punch line.” Make sure the final line wraps up everything, is funny, references the rest of the poem, and that the rhythm and rhyme work – easy, right?
For another limerick example, check out Next Time from my book GONE FISHING: A Novel In Verse.
Enjoy writing limericks!
Thank you for joining me for this National Poetry Month series on poetic forms!
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Here are a few announcements:
Today, children's author and fifth-grade teacher Marcie Atkins is revealing the mentor text lesson plan she developed for Gone Fishing
E Kristin Anderson featured my essay on the influence Les Miserables had on my verse novel at Write All the Words
Laura Salas is hosting Poetry Friday at Writing the World for Kids
Reader Comments (3)
I love limericks, but am not adept at writing them. I guess that's why we practice, practice, practice. I love your limerick about writing a limerick. Clever! =)
Reply: Hi Bridget! Yes, practice helps, doesn't it? Thanks for stopping by and for your nice words.
I have to agree with Bridget - that was an ingenious poem - a limerick within a limerick! How fun! Edward Lear is my favorite of all times. :)
Reply: Hi Myra. Thanks so much for this nice comment. Yes, Edward Lear is the Grand Daddy of humorous poetry!
Great explanation, Tamera. I like limericks OK, and I'm on top of the meter, but I find that mind always turn out kind of flat....
Reply: Hi Laura. Hmmm. I do focus on that last line - if it's funny, then the the rest of the poem can all lead up to it. Keep trying. I bet yours aren't as flat as you think.