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Haiku and limerick redux?

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Haiku and limerick redux?
Posted by Overmod on Tuesday, May 12, 2020 9:34 AM

In looking at the reference for EcoRail, I note a blog post about rail haiku, with a note linking to a Trains forum thread many years ago.  Rather than resuscitate it as a zombie thread (even if it does have Ed Blysard contribution) I propose that we start a new poetry thread here.

Haiku is a Japanese 'sonnet form' with a regular meter and a pattern of 3 lines, with 5/7/5 syllables in each.

"He tried for the main/Puffing on his oxygen/But he's in the hole"

In many cases the poem is written to accompany a particular image or picture, and the Canadian blog post makes quite a bit of this.

A limerick has five lines and a particular meter, with the first, second, and fifth rhyming together, and a shorter rhyming couplet for the third and fourth.  (In the original, the first and fifth lines used the same word for the rhyme, but this lacked the right 'punch'

"Will Woodard, he tried with no luck/The American Arch trailing truck --/Crews in night or in rain/Tried to back up the train/But would quickly yell... "

well, you get the idea.*

Let's see what might develop.

 

*More family-friendly versions, somewhat reminiscent of a certain song about shaving cream,  include lines like "But would quickly find things went amuck" or would finish with an expression like "Lord love a duck!"

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