Clerihew

    •  Clerihew (definition from wikipedia): A short comic or nonsensical verse, typically in two rhyming couplets with lines of unequal length and referring a famous person. The rhyme scheme is usually AABB, and the rhymes are often forced (Schwager translation: think of an awkward sounding limerick). The line length and meter are irregular (Schwager translation: do as you wish with line length; no anapests needed in your meter; easy). Edmund Clerihew Bentley (1875--1956) invented the clerihew in school and then popularized it in books. One of his best known is this (1905):
      Sir Christopher Wren
      Said, "I am going to dine with some men.
      If anyone calls
      Say I am designing St. Paul's."



    Nicolas de Largillière, François-Marie Arouet dit Voltaire (vers 1724-1725) -001.jpg

    It was a weakness of Voltaire’s
         To forget to say his prayers,
    And one which to his shame
         He never overcame.







    Noah’s
    Boas
    Kept his hares
    In Pairs.

                    -- Sue Lampi (1994) 







    George Orwell
    Answered the doorbell.
    Big Brother’s Pizza at the door,
    Two with pepperoni, $19.84.






     http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Frans_Hals_-_Portret_van_Ren%C3%A9_Descartes.jpg

    Did Descartes
    Depart
    With the thought
    "Therefore I'm not"? 








    Lovely old Queen Bess
    Always in proper dress.
    Can't leave her castle
    Without so much hassle.










    Jackson Pollock
    facing possible painter's block
    discovered that what matters
    to the critics were his splatters.


     

    Sigmund Freud LIFE.jpg


    The ignorant pronounce it Frood,
           To cavil or applaud.
    The Well-informed pronounce it Froyd,
           But I pronounce it Fraud.


           -- G. K. Chesterton (of course) 


    Journal: Light Verse: Please compose at least one clerihew and at least one limerick for tomorrow.


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