Definitely Limericks by Rory Ewins

A-Ab

The start of the alphabet, a,
Can rhyme with its next letter, b,
If pronouncing them, maybe,
As if you’re a baby:
With schwa sounds, the kind heard in huh.

In Britain, “the top of the pops”
Means a song that you’ll see in the shops
From London to Tayside—
The number one A-side
Of singles that haven’t been flops.

Playing records, the part I loved most
Was to flip ’em and sample the host
Of odd B-sides thereon.
Will those days soon be gone,
Now that seven-inch singles are toast?

In the pub quiz, each answer I’d utter,
The quizmaster “uh-uh” would mutter.
“So it’s hot, and it’s slow...
It’s a sauna-bath... No?”
“It’s lava.” “Oh, a‘a,” I splutter.

The Hawaiian name for lava flows with a rough, jagged surface.

The aardvark explores after dark
Every inch of this African park
With his tongue and his claws
For those termites he gnaws
So he won’t end up starving, and cark.

Frau Aardvark once tried, for a lark,
To de-trouser her spouse in the dark.
As she snuffled about
In his pants with her snout,
She cried, “Vot you got ’ere? It’s ’ard... vark!

The dog and the wolf have both starred
In movies and books of regard,
And even a civet
Or hyena will rivet;
But aardwolves are doing it ’ard.

An abada stabbed at a crab
With its fabulous horn, but a grab
From a claw at its nose
Made the rhino suppose
That the forecast for dining was drab.

An obsolete name for the rhinoceros, stressed on the first syllable.

America’s feeling elation
At Bush hanging onto his station—
Apart from those few
Casting votes for the blue,
Who are fearing abalienation.

A piece to mark post-election day 2004, using an obsolete word for “alienation”.

Tony Abbott, once called the “Mad Monk”
By Aussies who reckoned he stunk,
Has become our prime minister,
An outcome so sinister
We’re sitting around in a funk.

And here’s a piece to mark Australia’s post-election day 2013.

Those Americans think ABC
Is American; Aussies like me
Know this broadcaster airs
Its shows here, but who cares,
Just as long as there’s stuff on TV.

In the USA, ABC stands for the advertising-funded American Broadcasting Company, launched as a radio and then television network in the 1940s. It was owned by Paramount for many years; today it is a Disney company. In Australia, the ABC is the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the national broadcaster funded by the federal government. Founded as the Australian Broadcasting Commission in 1932, effectively replacing the privately run Australian Broadcasting Company, “Auntie” has broadcast commercial-free radio programmes since its inception and television since 1956. Its distinctive logo is based on a Lissajous curve.

Ooohhhhhh Aberdeen, finest city of granite,
With a number of thoroughfares which span it,
And some bridges, they say,
Quite like the one o’er the Tay
Near by Dundee, fairest toun on the planet.

In memory of William Topaz McGonagall (1825-1902), poet.

I don’t care what you say, Dad, okay?
I am not going outside to play.
Sure, I like playing games
With Jemima and James,
But abide by your ruling? No way!

If you’re tired of dressing up formally,
Consider behaving abnormally:
Cover up in a sheet,
And wear clogs on your feet,
And groan like a ghost, paranormally.

When it came time for Nature to form us,
She gave us no fur that might warm us—
Though some are too hairy
(Like werewolves—quite scary).
Did she err, or prefer the abnormous?

An old word for “abnormal”.

A yeti once wanted a brother,
So asked his abominable mother
To honour her name
And behave with no shame.
The final result? Yeti ’nother.

Aboriginal Tasmanians’ small
Population size took a sharp fall
At the hands of disease
And the British, but please
Don’t describe them as gone—they’re not all.

When the British colonised Van Diemen’s Land, there were between three and fifteen thousand Palawa (or Pakana) people living on the island, who had arrived forty thousand years earlier and had been isolated from the outside world for eight thousand years. Introduced diseases, warfare and violence at the hands of settlers drastically reduced their numbers in the early nineteenth century, until only a relative handful survived, moved by British authorities from camp to camp around the colony.

According to popular belief, the last full-blooded Aboriginal Tasmanian, Truganini, died in 1876, although it has been established that there were others who outlived her; but the concept of “full-blooded” is problematic in that it accepts nineteenth-century ideas about racial purity and allowed the myth of Tasmanian Aboriginal extinction to take root. There are still many descendants today who identify as Tasmanian Aborigines—possibly more than there were before the British arrived (by 2016 estimates, from 6,000 to over 23,000).

As Governor Phillip traversed
Sydney Harbour, he doubtless conversed
With his fellows, “So what
Should we label that lot?”
“Aborigines. They were here first.”

Governor Arthur Phillip sailed into Port Jackson (now Sydney Harbour) to found the colony of New South Wales in January 1788. Not everyone was thrilled, either onboard or off.

“Your brother’s a hell of a skite!
He can sing his own praises all night.
Says his fame is widespread
For his record in bed.”
“Oh, he does, does he? Sounds about right.”

An abridger takes so much away
That you lose any sense of the play
Of the words and [removed]
And yet nothing’s improved—
You can guess what the author would say.

Said a man to the reverend, “So,
Your mate Jesus... like, how can you know?
Don’t you find it quite odd,
This assumption he’s God?”
All he said, with abruptness, was: “No.”

“Agent 007, I’m fond
Of the way you attempt to abscond.
Tell me, when’s your next try?”
“Mister Blofeld, a spy
Never hides—as my word is my bond.”

If half of the voters, like you,
Vote for red, and a half plus one blue,
You may not think it right
That the blue win the night,
But an absolute majority do.

A virgin could not acquiesce
When his girlfriend began to undress.
“Please stop it!” he cried,
To which she replied,
“I abhor your abstemiousness.”

A gallery patron’s distractedness
Can tell us about her impactedness:
How the art makes her feel,
And whether it’s real,
Or whether there’s too much abstractedness.

Our lecturer blamed the abstruseness
Of the book on its patent diffuseness.
But I’m onto his game—
And the author, the same:
I suspect it was just their obtuseness.

Abudefduf is not some mistake
That a kid on a keyboard would make
When he randomly hits
Any key with his mitts;
It’s a damsel fish—no, it’s not fake.

“It’s ‘more than sufficient’, my dear,”
Said my aunt, “and it’s ‘ample’, I hear.
Defining abundant
Is never redundant;
I’ve made that abundantly clear.”

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