A nervous young woman called Fay
Always used to react with dismay
At a match being struck,
Or the quack of a duck.
‘Hello, Fay!’ made her faint clean away.
There once was a fellow called West
Who found it quite hard to get dressed.
He used to quite dread
Putting socks on his head
And getting both legs through his vest.
There once was a man from Manila
Who christened his young son Attila.
It was only in fun –
But he grew up a Hun,
Renowned through the world as a killer.
A singer related to Brahms
Showed an ambulance driver her charms.
He liked them so much
He allowed her to touch
The knob that set off the alarms.
A lady from near Milton Keynes
Had trouble digesting her greens.
The odd Brussels sprout
Would find its way out,
But the greens that brought screams were French beans.
A young shipping clerk from Port Said
Was found with his arms and legs tied
Inside an old trunk
That belonged to a monk
To whom, for advice, he’d applied.
A young mountaineer called Vic
Became quite close friends with a stick.
He took it for walks,
And they had little talks,
Then it left him to live with a brick.
A young man from Berwick-on-Tweed
Kept a very strange thing on a lead.
He was never once seen
To give it a clean
Or anything else it might need.
There once was a fellow called Maude
Who became very easily bored,
One day, at a lunch,
He fell in a bunch
Of lupins, and lay there, ignored.
There was a young fellow called Lloyd
Who everyone tried to avoid.
It wasn’t the smell,
Or the stories he’d tell,
But the way he pronounced Betws-y-Coed.
(Author’s note: This limerick will work best for experienced Welsh speakers.)
An Ilford dog-trainer called Mellish
Made a miniature poodle’s life hellish.
It was thought well deserved
When a dog so reserved
One night ate him, with evident relish.
A man from the north, called Adair,
When he washed, never took proper care:
At first it was spots,
Then rashes, then lots
Of patches of unwanted hair.
An arm-wrestling vicar from Looe
Invited some friends to a do.
Dressed only in shorts,
He taught them some sports
They thought very few vicars knew.
A young discus-thrower called Earl
Could not take his eyes off a girl,
Which is rather bad luck –
With them hopelessly stuck
He can no longer see where to hurl.
There was a young man from Kashmir
Who shouted, one day, ‘Over here!’
But from so far away
That he’s still there today,
And will be for ever, I fear.
A curious fellow called Stoat
Bought jewellery and things for a goat.
For favours like these
It gave milk and cheese
And kicked him one day in the throat.
There once was a tortoise called Joe
Whose progress was painfully slow.
He’d stop for a week,
Look around, take a peek,
Then unlike a shot, off he’d go.
There once was a camper called Jack
Who found a huge snake in his pack.
He cut it in two,
Gave half to the zoo,
And then put the other half back.
A peculiar fellow called Long
Once sat on a very sharp prong.
He gave a great shout –
As his friends pulled it out.
Then he sat on the next one along.
A man by the name of Geneen
Was asked by his wife where he’d been.
He Ummed and he Ahhhed –
So she hit him, quite hard,
On the head, with a large soup tureen.
A handsome young fellow called Miles
Used to help pretty girls over stiles.
Once over the top
One or two used to stop,
But the rest kept on going for Miles.
A curious lady called Davies
Used to make threatening phone calls to Avis.
She’d pretend to be mad,
And ask if they had
Any cars called Lucinda or Mavis.
An excitable fellow called Gomez
Told his dog ‘I don’ wanna no mess.
Cleaning the floor
I ain’t doin’ no more,
And I’ve had it with nasty aromas.’
A young scuba-diver called Jeff
Was so good at holding his breff
He could swim anywhere
On a lungful of air
Which scared his poor muvver to deff.
A Tory backbencher called Sandys
Detested the sound of brass bandys.
When they started to play
He’d run far away,
And cover his head with his handys.
(Author’s note: Ask an aged relative how to pronounce ‘Sandys’)
A lodger from Brighton called Briggs
Had a penchant for syrup of figs;
Though he did what he could,
The results were so good
He had to keep moving his digs.
A mother from Seascale called Pippa
Found some nuclear waste in a kipper.
When she told them she’d found it,
They said, ‘Eat around it,
And keep it away from the nipper.’
A curious young man from Calcutta
Was known as a bit of a nutter.
After prawn vindaloo
And a Guinness or two
He’d lie, very still, in the gutter.
A handsome young fellow called Frears
Was attracted to girls by their ears.
He’d traverse the globe
For a really nice lobe,
And the sight would reduce him to tears.
There was a young lady called Marge
Who liked men with features quite large.
Her long line of suitors
Had whacking great hooters,
Apart from a Monsieur Lafarge.
There once was a fellow called Scaggs,
Who kept all his things in black bags.
When people asked why,
He’d admit, with a sigh,
There were certainly all sorts of snags.
A South African farmer called Ted
Attacked a brick wall with his head.
The blow could be felt,
All over the veldt,
And in less than an hour he was dead.
The Penarth Double Limerick
A fisherman’s wife from Penarth
Invented a new way to laugh,
Using both of her feet
And a long rubber sheet
Which her son folded neatly in half.
When she felt a good joke coming on,
She’d shout, ‘Get the rubber sheet, John!’
But when it was found
And laid out on the ground
Whatever was funny had gone.
One day in a small town on Skye
A finger turned up in a pie,
Then a nose and two lips,
Then a fine pair of hips,
Then a waitress jumped out and said, ‘Hi!’
An impetuous Welshman called Caine
Threw some half-eaten fish from a train.
It struck an MP
Which, I’m sure you’ll agree,
Showed a truly impeccable aim.
A refuse collector called Bert
Had a priceless collection of dirt
Covered up by a screen
To keep it all clean,
With a guard dog on constant alert.
An optician who practised in Rye
Sadly had only one eye.
He’d given the other
To somebody’s brother,
And it wasn’t the thing to ask why.
There was a young fellow called Priestley,
Whose behaviour to women was beastly.
He’d promise them wine
And a jolly good time –
Then give them a weekend in Eastleigh.
A very smart lady from Rye
Had an accent that gave her awye.
She said she was posh,
Which they all knew was tosh –
She came from East Ham, so they sye.
A cartoonist from Worksop,
called Botts, Tied himself in such intricate knots
That even his friends
Could not find the ends,
And he died, still unravelled, in Notts.
A Sussex fast bowler called Lyall
Took a run-up of nearly a mile.
In one Gillette Cup
He never turned up –
And was last seen just south of the Nile.
A young ballet dancer called Bruce
Wore tights that were rather too loose.
As he leapt through the air
All his skills were laid bare,
And his face went a very bright puce.
An ageing shot-putter called Carl
Used to pull back his lips in a snarl,
Revealing, beneath,
Several rows of white teeth
And a bridge he’d had fitted in Arles.
A greedy young fellow called Wrench
Owned a cat, two small dogs, and a tench.
One day, in a trice,
He cooked them with rice,
And called the dish something in French.
A jolly old fellow called Boakes
Knew five thousand eight hundred jokes,
Which, ranging from bad
To the dismally sad,
He tried out on helpless old folks.
There once was a poet called Sime
Who avoided the obvious rhyme.
He put ‘this’ after ‘that’,
And ‘dog’ after ‘cat’,
And he hated this sort of last line.
A Wrexham tattooist called Ken
Used to draw little pictures on men;
Sometimes a still life,
Or another man’s wife,
Or, once in a while, Tony Benn.
A curious fellow called Lamb
Used to shout things at old tins of Spam
Like, ‘You silly old tin!’
And, ‘Where have you been?’
Then he’d move on and rubbish the jam.
A trainee magician called Mick
Made a frightful mistake with a trick,
When he turned a small boy,
His mum’s pride and joy,
Irreversibly into a brick.
There was a young fellow called Clem
Who possessed quite remarkable phlegm:
When he once by mistake
Choked to death on a cake,
He got up and did it again.
There was a young fellow called Grist
Who found the girls hard to resist.
He’d give them the eye,
But was so deeply shy
That he always just missed being kissed.
A highly-strung lady called Weems,
Once caught a man in her dreams.
He vanished away
In the cold light of day –
But he left her some peppermint creams.
A veterinary surgeon from Fife
Once dressed up to frighten his wife.
When asked, ‘Is it wise?’
He replied in surprise,
‘Where I come from this sort of thing’s rife.’
A lady from Louth with a lisp
Liked her sausages specially crisp.
But in trying to say
That she liked them that way
She covered her friends in a mitht.
An earnest young lady called Soames
Wrote a very large book about gnomes;
But the tales were so tall
And the sales were so small
She was left with huge unwanted tomes.
There once was a fellow called Doyle
Who covered up people with soil
Long before they were dead –
Which would make them seem red,
And bring quite placid chaps to the boil.
A gravedigger’s helper called Maddox
He made little paddles,
And waterproof saddles,
But the fish never stayed in the paddocks.
A lady from Brighton called Palmer
Became quite an expert snake charmer.
The snakes called her Miss,
And gave a loud hiss
When it looked as if someone would harm her.
A research biochemist from Goring
Found cricketers rather alluring.
He’d turn up at the match
And hope for a catch
Or something a bit more enduring.
A lady from Bristol called Bligh,
Who all of her life had been shy,
Was cured in a week
By two Poles and a Greek Whom she met on the Island of Skye.
There once was a teacher called Fox,
Who kept something rare in a box.
One night, as dawn broke,
The creature awoke
And ran off with his shoes and his socks.
A Yorkshireman living in Worcester
Said to his wife, ‘Fetch a duster.
This table from Hull
Has gone ever so dull.
A duster will bring back its lustre.’
(To be read only in a Yorkshire accent.)
There once was a fellow called God,
Whom everyone thought rather odd.
Apart from a lady,
Called Eileen O’Grady,
Who worshipped the ground that he trod.
A fisherman living in York
Complained that the length of the walk
From his house to the sea Took two days or three,
And more if he stopped for a talk.
There was a young man from Melrose
Who had a large thing on his nose,
One on his back,
And three in a sack,
And four between each of his toes.
A handsome young German called Fritz,
On seeing a friend do the splits,
With a triumphant cry,
Shouted, ‘Here, let me try!’
And broke into two equal bits.
There once was a lady called Tate
Who won a live bear at a fete.
To her home it was led,
But it hadn’t been fed,
And the police got there seconds too late.
A vicar from Esher called Hughes
Used to greatly enjoy a quick snooze
At lunchtime or tea,
If the pulpit was free,
And if not, he’d kip in the pews.
A man called O’Hara one day
Decided he’d make the world pay.
He wrote down a plan
To destroy every man –
But the wind came and blew it away.
A young man from Beccles,
called Duke, Discovered one day,
by a fluke, If he put on a fez
And a little pince-nez
He looked like the young King Farouk.
A young mountaineer from Nepal
Invented a new way to fall.
It worked out so well
That no one could tell
Where he was – if he’d landed at all.
When asked tricky questions old Riley
Would simply reply, very drily,
‘I’m sorry, old bean,
I don’t know what you mean,’
Then sidle off home, smiling wryly.
A chiropodist – friends call her Dawn –
Used to do people’s feet on her lawn;
But the neighbours complained
When a lady, unnamed,
Was hit in the eye by a corn.
A travelling salesman called Lloyd
Was known as a man to avoid.
The horrified stares
As he showed off his wares
Was a sight that he clearly enjoyed.
There was a young fellow called Ben,
Who angered his friends now and then
By running up stairs
And shouting, ‘Who cares?’
Then doing the whole thing again.
A girl from Carlisle called Lucy