Limerick Meter

[evelyn_carroll]

evelyn_carroll Put a lot of time into writing an erotic poem in limerick form. He deserves a mention just for the effort. It would appeal more to me if the metre was more consistent, but perhaps that is just my non-Irish tongue misreading syllables.

Limerick Boy

Whilst hitch-hiking up to Cavan
A Stab City boy known as Dan
Hailed down a truck –
Not believing his luck –
And clambered up into the van.

The driver, he learnt, was called Pat:
A Hell’s Angel once, but now fat.
In the back of the van
Was another big man
And a sad-looking punk in a hat.

They drove till they came to a clearing
And dragged poor Irish Dan out of hearing.
But just before that
The lad in the hat
Said ‘I think I know just what you’re fearing.’
. . .

* * *

I’m not sure if this thread is the right place to discuss Poetics; but here goes, until you all flame me.

I was exercised by the comment that Rybka made on the thread about the meter of my Limerick boy. I too thought there was something not quite right when I was writing it. I remember sitting there, counting syllables on my fingers. It all seemed perfect (apart from one line where I make a very amateurish attempt at a sprung rhythm rather forced on me by the need for a rhyme with 'come'). But it still felt weird. Then I tried reciting it in dialect and it seemed perfect again (Ryba seems to have noticed this too.) But there was still one inexplicable oddity: I found myself switching from Stage Irish to Yorkshire Blunt about halfway through, in order to maintain the pace.

The explanation is what Rybka has now made me seek. The syllabic pattern is (barring the odd careless mistake) pretty even. But the stresses are not even; they're all over the place. This seems to be what enhances the feeling of dialect. I wonder. Is there a theorem lurking here?
Evelyn

 

[Tathagata]

I’m not sure if this thread is the right place to discuss Poetics; but here goes, until you all flame me.

I was exercised by the comment that Rybka made on the thread about the meter of my Limerick boy. I too thought there was something not quite right when I was writing it. I remember sitting there, counting syllables on my fingers. It all seemed perfect (apart from one line where I make a very amateurish attempt at a sprung rhythm rather forced on me by the need for a rhyme with 'come'). But it still felt weird. Then I tried reciting it in dialect and it seemed perfect again (Ryba seems to have noticed this too.) But there was still one inexplicable oddity: I found myself switching from Stage Irish to Yorkshire Blunt about halfway through, in order to maintain the pace.

The explanation is what Rybka has now made me seek. The syllabic pattern is (barring the odd careless mistake) pretty even. But the stresses are not even; they're all over the place. This seems to be what enhances the feeling of dialect. I wonder. Is there a theorem lurking here?
Evelyn

I've had Yorkshire pudding but never smoked a Yorkshire blunt.

what, exactly, is stage Irish?
Is that like the Dick Van Dyke stage Cockney?

Limericks have everything to do with accent and regional dialect.
Being from Mass there are words and town that are pronounced far differently from how they appear in print.
this not only affects the syllable count but the rhyme also.
thus:
"Worcester" would rhyme with and have the same syllable count as " pushed her"

 

[Boxlicker101]

I’m not sure if this thread is the right place to discuss Poetics; but here goes, until you all flame me.

I was exercised by the comment that Rybka made on the thread about the meter of my Limerick boy. I too thought there was something not quite right when I was writing it. I remember sitting there, counting syllables on my fingers. It all seemed perfect (apart from one line where I make a very amateurish attempt at a sprung rhythm rather forced on me by the need for a rhyme with 'come'). But it still felt weird. Then I tried reciting it in dialect and it seemed perfect again (Ryba seems to have noticed this too.) But there was still one inexplicable oddity: I found myself switching from Stage Irish to Yorkshire Blunt about halfway through, in order to maintain the pace.

The explanation is what Rybka has now made me seek. The syllabic pattern is (barring the odd careless mistake) pretty even. But the stresses are not even; they're all over the place. This seems to be what enhances the feeling of dialect. I wonder. Is there a theorem lurking here?
Evelyn

I have to agree with Rybka about the meters of the poem. Reading in ordinary American english, this is what I come up with:

Whilst HITCH-hiking up to Cavan 8 syllables
A STAB City boy known as Dan 8 syl.
Hailed DOWN a truck – 4 syl.
Not beLIEving his luck – 6 syl
And CLAMbered up into the van. 8 syl.

The DRIver, he learnt, was called Pat: 8 syl.
A HELL'S Angel once, but now fat. 8 syl.
In the BACK of the van 5 syl
Was aNOTHer big man 6 syl
And a SAD-looking punk in a hat. 9 syl

They DROVE till they came to a clearing 9 syl.
And DRAGGED poor Irish Dan out of hearing. 10 syl.
But JUST before that 5 syl.
The LAD in the hat 5 syl.
Said ‘I THINK I know just what you’re fearing.’ 10 syl.
. . .

 

[My Erotic Tale]

How does one know
the syllables of a row
did they stop the flow
of a poem read slow
to count the syllables
and say, "Behold"
all your syllables
are not in a row!

I find it much easier
to read a poem
and absorb its meaning
than to do the
grammar beatings.
I personally
thought the poem was
very easy to read
reguardless the content
or syllables, yeah I know
I didn't count syllables
I read the poem.

 

[Liar]

Basically, this is the meter you want to have in a limerick:

#-(#)-# #-#-# #-#-# (#)
#-(#)-# #-#-# #-#-# (#)
#-(#)-# #-#-#
#-(#)-# #-#-#
#-(#)-# #-#-# #-#-# (#)

# are syllables. You read them in threes , with the last, bold one intonated. The # in parenthesis can be omitted. A line can be for instance #-pause-# #-#-# #-#-# - "a troll in the back of my head" as opposed to a line with all syllales in: "When I came to the station in Dover".

Purple lines rhymes with eachother and green with eachother.

What else? Um...traditionally, they're about people from places "There once was a girl from Nantucket".

I think that's aboiut it.

 

[evelyn_carroll]

Gosh!

I didn't expect all this really useful feedback. Thanks guys, Especially boxlicker for the careful deconstruction. It look about right too. I gonna go away and translate into trochee/iambus/anapest/dactyl form and do a rethink. I would make one point though: if you read it out loud it WORKS. It's alway interesting to take a form and breakl the rules just a little. E.g. I wonder if anyone noticed that in the middle of Heroic Coupling, ostensibly a parody useing heroid rhyming iambic pentameter couplets, there is actually a triplet? I think that worked nicely too. But Pope wouldnay ha' done it!

Thanks again
E

 

[evelyn_carroll]

More thoughts

Right. I’ve had the leisure to think a bit (while the economy’s so slow).

I think this must be the most famous limerick in the world. It’s always read WITHOUT dialectal accent. Allow me to analyze it a little.

There was a young lady from Gloucester
9 syllables – de DA | de DA | DA de de | DA de (2 iambs, dactyl, trochee)
Whose parents thought they had lost her
8 syllables – de DAAA | DA | DA de de | DA de
See what happens here: whose Paaaair – nts. You stretch the stress syllable of the first iambus to cover the next weak syllable.
All they found in the grass
6 – DA de | DA de | de DA (2 trochs, iamb)
Were the marks of her arse
6 – DA de | DA de | de DA (ditto)
And the knees of the fellow that crossed her
10 syllables –DA de | DA de de | DA de de | DA de (trochee, 2 dactyls, trochee)

Let’s now go from the most famous to the BEST one ever (IMNSHO).

The dirty old bishop of Birmingham
10 syllables – de DA | de DA | DA de de | DA de de (2 iambs, 2 dactyl)
Buggered young boys while confirming ‘em
9 syllables –DA de | DA de de | DA de de de (troch, 2 dactyl)
He’d lift up the cassock
6 – DA de | DA de | DA de (3 trochs)
And kneel on a hassock
6 – DA de | DA de | DA de (3 trochs)
And pump his episcopal sperm in ‘em
10 syllables – de DA | de DA | DA de de | DA de de (2 iambs, 2 dactyl)

You can change the second line to
Would bugger young boys while confirming ‘em
10 syllables – de DA | de DA | DA de de | DA de de (2 iambs, 2 dactyl)
or
Always buggered young boys while confirming ‘em (11 syllables)

ALL THREE WAYS WORK. It depends on the reader’s ability to measure the length of the syllables appropriately.

What I learn from all this is that syllable matches are less important that foot-type matches. If line 1 ends in a dactyl then so must 2 and 5. In the famous Young Lady from Ealing there are only 5 syllables in the central couplet:
She laid on her back
And opened her crack

I’ve been trying to find an example where the number of syllables is assymetric too, but I’ll have to get back to you on that. Of course, Limerick boy has some; but it doesn’t carry the weight of precedent.

Ah! Thought of one now. Here’s a very famous one that seems to break even more rules but is still quoted avidly by spotty schoolboys around the world. I leave it to you to analyze.

There once was a fella from Buckingham
He stood on the bridge at Uppingham
Watching the stunts
Of the cunts in the punts
And the tricks of the pricks who were fucking’em.

So, on these precedents, the limetrick is really rather a flexible form. The basic syllable/rhyme structure is
9 a
9 a
5 b
5 b
9 a

The rhyme scheme is fixed. The syllable count and beat structure are not. Line endings must match metrically though. Variation adds interest. Intra line rhymes add oomph.

Anyone wanna take this further and come up with some other rules and metarules?

I’ve just had a reality moment. I only came on this sight to write (and read????) wank stories. How the fuck did I get diverted into all this poetry stuff?
Bye
E.

PS It’s a good party game too. First get a little drunk. Then make up the first line. The person on your left has to rhyme the second, and so on. If they get stuck, they take a drink and another person can volunteer the line.

 

[Liar]

There was a young lady from Gloucester
9 syllables – de DA | de DA | DA de de | DA de (2 iambs, dactyl, trochee)
Whose parents thought they had lost her
8 syllables – de DAAA | DA | DA de de | DA de
See what happens here: whose Paaaair – nts. You stretch the stress syllable of the first iambus to cover the next weak syllable.
All they found in the grass
6 – DA de | DA de | de DA (2 trochs, iamb)
Were the marks of her arse
6 – DA de | DA de | de DA (ditto)
And the knees of the fellow that crossed her
10 syllables –DA de | DA de de | DA de de | DA de (trochee, 2 dactyls, trochee)

Interesting way you divide the lines. That's not quite the way I read it. However hard I try, I can't seem to emphasise a lot of the syllables that you do.

There was a young lady from Gloucester
Whose pa - rents thought they had lost her
All they found in the grass
Were the marks of her arse
And the knees of the fellow that crossed her

That's how it reads for me, which fits into the rhythm of threes perfectly.

...or whatever they are called. Since you seem to be down with the terminology: de-DA is an iamb, DA-de is a trochee, DA-de-de is a dactyl. What to you call a de-de-DA? Because that's what I see everywhere in the limerick rhythm. The whole thing is a watlz, even the spacing between lines is regulated by that tempo.

I’ve just had a reality moment. I only came on this sight to write (and read????) wank stories. How the fuck did I get diverted into all this poetry stuff?

Ah yes, one of life's great enigmas.

 

[evelyn_carroll]

I daren't disagree with Liar

You're right; you CAN hear the rhythm that way. di di Da is called an anapest, I think. It's maybe to do with accent (mine's Cockney - Dick Van Dyke eat yer 'art out). I don't think it nullifies my conclusions about variation though. Also, it dosn't work for Birmingham in the English pronunciation: BURR ming um as opposed to bur minG HAM.

Oh Shit! Did I really type sight for site in the last one?
Bad little e.

 

[evelyn_carroll]

I'm not a poet, but

Found some intersting stuff via Google.
http://www.sfu.ca/~finley/discussion.html agrees with liar about the anapests but is Canadian, so the regional thing is still interesting.
http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200201/msg00603.html has a much more interesting take that is more like mine. Perhaps it a nerd thing.
E.

 

[evelyn_carroll]

da do RON

Liar asks about anapaests. (I’ve spelt it the English way this time.) A friend just reminded me of a rhyme she was made to learn at school from (she thinks) a book by Flint and Flint called (she thinks) Poetry in Perspective. I can’t find it on Amazon.

Iambus comes with steady pace.
Next the Trochee takes its place.
The Dactyl comes with pattering feet
And, last but not least,
Comes the rare Anapaest.

That really quite clever, I think. Form and Content!

Thanks Sue. A brain the size of the universe, more degrees than a thermometer, and you still can’t write a good clerihew when sober.
e e E

 

[Liar]

You're right; you CAN hear the rhythm that way. di di Da is called an anapest, I think. It's maybe to do with accent (mine's Cockney - Dick Van Dyke eat yer 'art out). I don't think it nullifies my conclusions about variation though. Also, it dosn't work for Birmingham in the English pronunciation: BURR ming um as opposed to bur minG HAM.

It works perfectly for Birmingham in that limeick whatever accent ya have. The intonation is still on the BIR.

But you're right. My formula was a bit to narrow. You can start and end each line with up to two passive syllables without breaking the rhythm. I still seem to read them in those anapest groupings, with (roughly) a tick of hesitiation after each. Which would make it a four stoke rhythm after all then. Huh.

The dir * ty old bish * op of Bir * mingham

Eh...better quit this while I still have some kind of sanity left.