To write a limerick, write five lines that rhyme AABBA. Lines 1, 2 and 5 get three beats each, lines 3 and 4 get two, and the rhythm runs da-da-DUM, with two light syllables before each beat. Start from the end: decide what the last line says and which word it finishes on, then build lines 1 and 2 to set it up and use the short lines 3 and 4 to turn toward it.
This guide covers the rules, the rhythm, a seven-step method and one limerick built from a notebook idea to the final version, with common mistakes and how to fix them. For fifty finished limericks to study, from Edward Lear to new ones about work and writing, see our limerick examples.
Limerick rules at a glance
| Rule | The standard | How strict |
|---|---|---|
| RuleLines | The standardFive | How strictStrict. Four or six lines is a different poem. |
| RuleRhyme scheme | The standardAABBA: lines 1, 2 and 5 rhyme; lines 3 and 4 rhyme with each other | How strictStrict. Breaking it on purpose is its own joke, the anti-limerick. |
| RuleBeats per line | The standard3, 3, 2, 2, 3 | How strictStrict. The beat pattern is what readers recognize. |
| RuleRhythm | The standardAnapests, da-da-DUM, often opening with a single light syllable | How strictLoose. One light syllable more or less is normal. |
| RuleSyllables | The standardAbout 8–9, 8–9, 5–6, 5–6, 8–9 | How strictLoose. Count beats, not syllables. |
| RuleTone | The standardLight, comic, often absurd | How strictNearly strict. The bounce tends to make any subject sound comic. |
| RuleOpening | The standard“There was a…” or “There once was a…”, plus a person and a place | How strictOptional. A tradition, not a rule. |
| RuleTitle | The standardUsually none | How strictOptional. |
The rhythm: da-da-DUM
Every limerick line is built from the same unit: two light syllables and a beat. Long lines have three of these units and short lines have two. The first light syllable of a line is often dropped, so a line can start on "da-DUM" as easily as "da-da-DUM".
The beat pattern
Lines 1, 2, 5: (da) da DUM da da DUM da da DUM
Lines 3, 4: (da) da DUM da da DUMHere is Edward Lear with the beats in bold. Notice that some lines start with one light syllable and some with two, and the poem never stumbles:
There was an Old Man on a hill,
Who seldom, if ever, stood still;
He ran up and down,
In his Grandmother's gown,
Which adorned that Old Man on a hill.
Three habits keep the rhythm honest:
- Beats land on words that matter. Nouns, verbs and adjectives take the beat; "the", "of" and "a" fill the gaps. If a beat falls on "on" or "the", the line is fighting its own meter.
- Extra light syllables go at the end, all together. A two-syllable rhyme such as Kilkenny and penny adds a light syllable after the last beat. That's fine if all three A lines do it.
- The tap test. Read the line aloud and tap the table on each beat. If you tap where you'd never stress the word in conversation, the line needs rewriting, not a stronger tap.
Prosodists also describe the limerick in amphibrachs (da-DUM-da), which puts the same beats on the same syllables. Our guide to meter in poetry explains both feet and scans a Lear limerick each way.
Write a limerick in 7 steps
Before you start, know the two ways a limerick can end. Lear's return repeats the last word of line 1 at the end of line 5 and lets one new word, often an adjective, carry the joke. A twist ends on a new rhyme word that changes how the first four lines read. The steps work for either, and the Leeds pair further down shows one limerick finished both ways.
- Choose a character and a situation
A limerick is a tiny story about one person, animal or object with one habit or problem. Write it as a plain sentence first: "My smoke alarm sleeps through real fires but screams at toast." For the traditional opening, give the character a place: "There once was a baker from Leeds."
- Find the joke and write it as line 5
Decide what happens at the end and how line 5 will land it. For a twist, phrase the line so the funniest word comes last: that word is the punchline and the third A rhyme, so it shapes everything above it. For Lear's return, line 5 ends on line 1's word, and the work goes into the one new word that sums up the character. If you can't say the joke in one sentence yet, you probably don't have the limerick yet.
- Build a rhyme bank
List the words that rhyme with your A sound. A twist needs three that suit the story, and the two for lines 1 and 2 should be plainer than the last; Lear's return needs only two, because line 5 repeats line 1. Listing more than you need gives you choices. If the rhymes you can find start deciding what happens, add to the bank or change the rhyme sound rather than bending the story to fit.
When the list runs thin, the Strokes Assistant can suggest rhymes on the sound beside your draft; keep only the ones that fit the story.
- Write lines 1 and 2
Line 1 introduces the character and sets the A sound. Line 2 states the habit or the problem. Both need three beats. Use the most ordinary rhymes from your bank here, so they don't steal attention from the ending.
- Keep lines 3 and 4 short and fast
Two beats each, on a new rhyme. This is the escalation: what happens, what someone asks, what goes wrong. Lear's favorite frame, "When they said… / He replied…", is a reliable shape for these two lines, and so is any pair of lines built the same way.
- Fit the punchline to the beat
Now shape line 5 into three beats that end on the rhyme word. In a twist ending, cut words before the punchline, not after it, so nothing follows the word that lands the joke. In Lear's return the joke word sits mid-line and line 1's ending follows it, as in "That hopeful Old Lady of Leeds" below.
- Read it aloud and revise
Tap the beats. Cut any word that is there only to fill the rhythm ("did", "so", "you see", "I am told"). Check that no word is said with the wrong stress. Expect most of the revising to happen inside single lines: one word swapped for a better-stressed one, one rhyme traded for another. Then read it to a critique partner and watch where they laugh, and where they don't.
One limerick, from idea to final
Here is the method applied to the smoke alarm, from the first note to the version worth keeping.
Smoke alarm. Silent last winter when the toaster actually caught fire. Goes off every time I make toast. It should go off when I read my draft aloud: that's the real emergency.
There once was a smoke alarm, see,
That was silent as silent can be.
When my toaster caught flame
It just stayed the same,
But it went off when I read my own book out loud to me.
Everything that usually goes wrong is here. "See" is filler bought for the rhyme. Line 2 spends three beats on one fact and a cliché, "silent as silent can be". "Stayed the same" is vague where the poem needs a picture. Line 5 has the right joke buried in fourteen syllables, against the usual eight or nine, and ends on "me", the weakest word in it.
The rhyme bank
The joke is the book, so "book" becomes the last word and the A sound is "-ook": book, cook, look, took, shook, hook, nook, crook, brook, overlook. Two plain partners are needed. "Nook" gives the alarm a place to sit, and "cook" sets up the kitchen. "Book" is saved for the end because it is the one the reader won't see coming.
My smoke alarm, high in its nook,
Never once made a sound when I'd cook.
Burnt the toast? Not a peep.
Lit the curtains? Asleep.
But it screamed when I read it my book.
- Lines 1 and 2 use the plain rhymes and do one job each: where the alarm is, what it fails to do.
- Lines 3 and 4 share a shape (a question, then a two-word answer), which makes them fast, and the second escalates from toast to curtains.
- Line 5 turns on "But" and ends on the surprise. Every beat in the poem falls on a word that matters.
- Nothing is explained. The reader decides for themselves that the alarm is a critic.
Lear's ending or a twist
There are two ways to finish a limerick. Edward Lear usually ends where he began, repeating the end of line 1 and letting one new word, often an odd adjective, carry the comedy. Many limericks written since end on a twist instead: a new rhyme word that changes the meaning of everything above it. The difference is easiest to see with lines 1 to 4 held still.
There was an Old Lady of Leeds,
Who planted her garden with beads;
When they asked, "Will they grow?"
She replied, "I don't know!"
That hopeful Old Lady of Leeds.
There was an Old Lady of Leeds,
Who planted her garden with beads;
When they asked, "Will they grow?"
She replied, "I don't know,
But they're doing much better than seeds."
The two endings are funny in different ways. The return works by understatement: the poem has gone somewhere absurd, and the narrator sums it up calmly in one adjective, so the comedy sits in "hopeful". The twist works by surprise: its last rhyme word makes you reread the four lines above it, here by revealing that her seeds do even worse than beads. The return is easier to write, because half of line 5 already exists. The twist needs a last word that is both expected, since it has to rhyme, and unexpected. Writing one limerick both ways is a good way to find out which ending a joke wants.
Rhymes: easy, hard and clever
A limerick needs three words on one rhyme sound and two on another, so the choice of sound decides how hard the poem will be.
| Rhyme sound | Partners to start from | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| Rhyme sound-ay | Partners to start fromday, way, say, May, stay, away, today | VerdictEasy: dozens of one-syllable words |
| Rhyme sound-ee | Partners to start fromtree, sea, three, tea, agree, degree | VerdictEasy |
| Rhyme sound-ight | Partners to start fromnight, light, bright, fright, polite, delight | VerdictEasy |
| Rhyme sound-ook | Partners to start frombook, cook, look, nook, hook, overlook | VerdictComfortable, with room for a surprise |
| Rhyme sound-ell | Partners to start frombell, tell, well, smell, hotel, farewell | VerdictComfortable |
| Rhyme soundorange, month, silver, purple | Partners to start fromAlmost no true rhymes | VerdictKeep them away from line ends |
- Two-syllable rhymes (Kilkenny and penny, Norway and doorway) add bounce. Lear uses them often. Keep all three A lines matched, or one line will sound short.
- Mosaic rhymes rhyme one word with two: the anonymous Tobago limerick rhymes "Tobago" with "may go", and Carolyn Wells rhymes "Tutor" with "toot, or". They are comic by nature and work best near the end.
- Identical rhymes, ending lines 1 and 5 on the same word, are fine as a deliberate Lear-style return. Anywhere else they look like a rhyme you couldn't find.
- Wrenched rhymes force the stress onto the wrong syllable: "mountain" made to rhyme with "again" by saying moun-TAIN. Most readers will hear it.
- Slant rhymes (home and alone) tend to deflate a limerick, because the form promises full rhymes. Use them only when the near-miss is the joke.
The general rules for rhyme and line endings in any poem are in our guide to writing a poem.
Common limerick mistakes
| Mistake | Draft line | Better |
|---|---|---|
| MistakeFiller to make up the beat | Draft lineThere once was a man, you see, | BetterThere once was a man from Dundee |
| MistakeWord order bent to reach the rhyme | Draft lineAnd home to his mother went Ted | BetterSo Ted went home early to bed |
| MistakeA beat on a weak word | Draft lineThen the dog jumped up on the bed | BetterThen the dog took a leap at the bed |
| MistakeA wrenched rhyme | Draft lineHe climbed every Scottish mountain / and then he came down again | BetterHe climbed every hill in the rain / and then he came down again |
| MistakeThe punchline in line 3 | Draft lineLines 4 and 5 restate a joke the reader already got | BetterMove the reveal to the last word of line 5 |
| MistakeExplaining the joke | Draft lineWhich is funny, since cats can't use phones | BetterCut it and end on the image that makes the point |
Tap the third row through to see the repair. Read with the limerick's da-da-DUM, the draft puts its middle beat on "on", while "jumped" and "up", the words speech wants to stress, fall between beats. The fix moves that beat to "leap", a word that carries it naturally, and gives each beat its two light syllables: then the, took a, at the.
One more, which isn't a mistake so much as a habit: starting every limerick with "There once was". It scans easily, which is one reason it's popular, but some of the best-known limericks start anywhere else ("A Tutor who tooted the flute", "As a beauty I'm not a great star"). If five lines need a serious mood rather than a joke, a different form will serve you better; the cinquain is five lines too, and it was built for quiet.
Frequently asked questions
How many syllables are in each line of a limerick?
Usually eight or nine in lines 1, 2 and 5, and five or six in lines 3 and 4. The count matters less than the beats: three in the long lines and two in the short ones, with one or two light syllables before each. A two-syllable rhyme such as penny or money adds one syllable to the end of a line, which is fine.
How do you make a limerick funny?
Decide how it ends before you write the rest. For a twist, end line 5 on the word that delivers the surprise; for Lear's return, put the joke in one new word, often an adjective, before line 1's ending comes back. Either way, keep lines 3 and 4 quick and keep a straight face about something ridiculous. Explaining the joke, or giving it away in line 3, flattens it.
Can a limerick have a title?
It can, though most don't. Edward Lear's limericks have no titles, only the pictures he drew for each. If you add one, use it to set up the situation, the way a newspaper headline would, and keep the punchline out of it, so the last line still arrives as a surprise.
