It seems to me there are two ways to go with nonsense verse, exemplified by Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear. Carroll goes for Nonsense with an edge. The Walrus and the Carpenter murder the poor little oysters and eat them. Lear gives us sadness, regret, something lost. Carroll is the greater artist, but Lear is probably more popular and, I think, is easier to do. Mervyn Peake does it. We are all sentimentalists at heart, are we not? Anyway, here's my Lear-y piece.
Prurient Tapirs
Prurient tapirs graced our lawns,
Many years ago.
They leapt like lucky leprechauns,
Flouncing and bouncing round our lawns,
While furtive, phantom flugelhorns,
Lamented, sweet and low.
In steamy, dreamy, dewy dawns,
They gambolled to and fro.
Memorious, magnificent
Reflections of romance,
Those pert Perissodactyls went,
Memorious, magnificent,
Through Sussex and the Weald of Kent
Across the sea to France
But what they were, and what was meant
By their perspicuous dance,
I do not know, I cannot say,
I cannot even think.
Alackaday! A roundelay!
I do not know, I cannot say
What made them pirouette and sway,
What made them jog and jink,
Those odd-toed ungulates at play
That vanished in a blink.
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