MAY 12th | TODAY IS:
NATIONAL LIMERICK DAY – Poet and author Edward Lear was born on May 12th in 1812. His “Book of Nonsense” was full of limericks.
A limerick is a poem with five lines; lines 1, 2 and 5 rhyme and lines 3 and 4 rhyme with each other.
I found llustrated versions of Lear’s book online and read through the various offerings. Obviously, being politically correct was not a thing in 1846. Some of them are rather dark.
The poetry that we learned in school was much more innocuous. For me, the most memorable limerick would be:
Hickory dickory dock
The mouse ran up the clock
The clock strike one
And down he run
Hickory dickory dock
Of course not all limericks are for sensitive ears. The famous first line “There once was a man from Nantucket” has many iterations both nice and naughty.
What is your favourite limerick?