Learicks -- improve on Lear
 

The "newly discovered Lear poems" thread reminded me of a contest the Washington Post once ran asking for limericks that start with two lines of a Lear limerick. I think the premise is that Lear started his limericks well but didn't finish them well, throwing away his L5 to basically repeat L1. Here are a few that I wrote for that contest. They're sort of fun to write, so I thought maybe some of you would like to give it a whirl.


There was an Old Person of Chili
Whose conduct was painful and silly;
For dinner she’d dine
On a baked porcupine,
Though it left her esophagus quilly.

*

There was a Young Lady whose nose
Was so long that it reached to her toes;
When Pinnochio walked by,
He said, "What's the lie
I must tell if I want one of those?"

*

There was a Young Girl of Majorca
Whose aunt was a very fast walker;
But the girl would insist
They instead dance the twist,
For the girl was a very fast torquer.

*

There was an Old Person of Cadiz
Who was always polite to the ladies,
And although he was old,
His conquests, all told,
Numerically topped Warren Beatty’s.

*

There was an Old Person of Rheims,
Who was troubled with horrible dreams;
But his wife said, "I'm glad!
I’m aware that sounds bad,
But his snores are far worse than his screams."

*

There was a Young Lady of Norway,
Who casually sat on a doorway;
When three men mistook her
For a common street hooker,
They asked, “What’s the price of a four-way?”

***

And for many other examples by others, here are the limericks/learicks that the Washington Post chose to publish. (Some of you may be stopped by the paywall).

Those are lovely, Roger. I especially like torquer for talker.

OK, here's one more:

There was an old man with a beard,
Who said: It is just as I feared.
My follicle prowess
Won’t impress a mouse.
That’s the rhyme that he had engineered.

John

Roger, these are great! I spent way too much time writing limericks based on popular songs a couple of weeks ago for the Washington Post’s Style Invitational, so I’ll try not to get too sucked into this… But, here’s a first attempt.

There was an Old Person whose habits,
Induced him to feed upon rabbits.
Said he, “Don’t say ‘yuck’;
I need feet for the luck —
And what monster would then waste the drab bits?”

There was an Old Person of Hurst,
Who drank when he was not athirst
From a hectoring bottle
That likely as not’ll
Soon cause his poor bladder to burst.

Good ones, Coleman.

I also entered some song limericks. Let's hope we see our names next week when the results come out, but it was fun either way.

A girl with a huge diamond neckless,
Was known to be terribly reckless.
It fell down a drain
At a hotel in Spain.
She just laughed at its loss, which was feckless.

Roger, thanks for starting this thread. I am stopped by the payroll, but I've read everything here, so I shall try.


There was on Old Man of the West,
Who never could get any rest;
So they knocked him spark out
With a huge Brussels sprout
They'd wrapped up in his own thermal vest.

- - -

There is a Young Lady whose nose
Continually prospers and grows.
It grew so very long,
She attracted the Dong:
He presented a fragrant red rose.

🌹

Fliss, how lovely to see the actual rose in question! These are all a lot of fun.

John

Nice ones, Jayne and Fliss! Roger, yes, I hope to see both our names next week. Did you submit anything for tomorrow’s song parody? I sent in a few for it; we’ll see what happens tomorrow.

Also, I’ve written more limericks…

There was a Young Lady of Turkey,
Who wept when the weather was murky.
But so far this summer
Sun’s also a bummer:
When melting, it’s hard to feel perky.

***

There was a Young Lady of Poole,
Whose soup was excessively cool.
She said, “I’ll just make it
A new protein shake!” It
Now sells double-priced as “Ab Fuel.”

***

There was an Old Man of Nepaul,
From his horse had a terrible fall.
He declared at a trot, “Um,
‘Round here we say ‘autumn,’
But, yes, it’s been simply banal.”

There was a Young Lady of Ryde
Whose shoe-strings were seldom untied;
But the day she went joggin’
And fell on her noggin,
Her death was pronounced ‘shoe-icide.’

**

There was a Young Lady of Parma
Whose conduct grew calmer and calmer;
So calm, so sedate,
That it spawned a debate
About whether to wake or embalm her.

**

There was an Old Man in a boat,
Who said, 'I'm afloat, I'm afloat!'
Then ironically he
Was engulfed by the sea,
Never to live down that quote.