By Ella Dorn, BA Chinese and Linguistics
The limerick, compact but sprightly, is my favourite verse form. I have previously written them in dead languages and submitted others to various anonymous Facebook pages; I even had to be stopped from writing my UCAS personal statement in limerick format.
This week, I’ve contributed to the field by writing a limerick diary. Follow me as I try to do some work, somehow get Zoom interviewed by a major publication, pull off a spur-of-the-moment all-nighter, learn a new language, and try to do a bit more work – all in Ireland’s best-loved meter.
Monday
In every girl’s life comes the time:
‘Heavens, how now shall I rhyme?’
I’ve no skill for haiku,
So this week I’ll make do –
Fair limerick, come and be mine!
Tuesday
I worked pretty hard, in defence,
(Go hard or go home, my pretense).
Wrote some new chengyu,
For class, a long review,
Of a book making no ounce of sense.
Wednesday
Today’s been a bit of a show,
(I can’t sleep right now, I’m aglow!)
It’s so hard to exhume,
When in this Zoom room,
Has been Bogart (perhaps) or Monroe!
‘On Thursday I sit here in class/All of my bones feel like glass’
Thursday
On Thursday I sit here in class,
All of my bones feel like glass.
Why’s it so painful?
Complaints? I’ve a brainful,
All-nighters are merely a farce.
Friday
The all-nighter, in fact, was a smash.
Well-rested, and stressed? Not a dash!
My sleep pattern’s sorted!
Why had I cavorted,
With moonlit reading of trash?
Saturday
Here I sit learning Korean,
Better than any plebeian.
At long last it’s clearer,
That half the words here are
Sinitic (not Indo-European).
Sunday
Today I must finish my work,
Log on, no time to divert –
To….music with bongos!
Japanese gameshows!
The oeuvre of one Douglas Sirk!
Photo caption: A busy typist. (Credit: David Klein, Unsplash)