Hard to answer because surprise, I think, has a lot to do with laughing out loud (in private, as opposed to when we're part of an audience), so we aren't likely to laugh out loud a second time at a poem--unless we've forgotten it.
Limericks seem to me well designed for delivering laughs. Here are four by John Ciardi, and, beneath those, four by others, which I suspect made me laugh the first time I read them.
There was a young man with a rod
Who thought he'd been chosen by G-d
To excercise Hell
From the girls. He meant well,
But the thunder said: "Exorcise--clod!"
I feel sorry for young Dr. Dow.
Our ladies won't go to him now.
When examining the parts
Of Mrs. Ray Hartz
He should have said "Hmmm" and not "Wow!"
On the talk show last night, Dr. Ellis,
The sex shrink, took two hours to tell us
It's alright to enjoy
A rosy-cheeked boy
So long as your sheep don't get jealous.
Said Sophocles, putting his X
To the contract for Oedipus Rex,
"I predict it will run
Until the Year One,
If the shooting script plays up the sex."
A youthful beef-packer named Young,
One day, when his nerves were unstrung,
Pushed his wife's ma--unseen--
In the chopping machine,
Then canned her and labelled her "Tongue."
--Anon
There was a young girl, a sweet lamb,
Who smiled as she entered a tram,
After she had embarked,
The conductor remarked,
"Your fare." And she said, "Yes, I am."
--Anon
An elderly sage of B'nai Brith
Told his friend he was quite full of pith.
This could mean "full of fact"
And "with meaning compact,"
But not when you're lithping like thith.
--Isaac Asimov
Said Wilbur Wright, "Oh, this is grand,
But Orville, you must understand.
We've discovered all right
The secret of flight--
The question is, how do we land?"
--Frank Richards
|