1.
A young nun was told by the Abbot:
"Consider the goat and the rabbit.
While they roll in the hay
You just stay home and pray.
You've got to get out of that habit."
(7/81)
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2.
The sadists of \alpha Centauri
Have a pleasure exceedingly gory.
It involves a time slip
And a neuronic whip --
Not your typical Asimov story.
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3.
Two bright boffins named Watson and Crick
Puzzled out what makes DNA tick.
It's just like spiral stairs
With the bases in pairs:
How on earth did God think of that trick?
(7/81)
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4.
Said a young man named A. Grothendieck:
"At geometry I'm rather weak.
I'm no Altschiller-Court
It's just not my {\it forte},
So I'd best make it more {\it algebrique}."
(1965?)
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5.
A dissolute Fellow of Caius
Contracted a social disaius.
Now, from St. John's to Cholmondeley
He twinges and glolmondeley
Turns purple whenever he paius.
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6.
X^n + Y^n = Z^n
A challenge for many long ages
Had baffled the savants and sages
But at last came the light:
Seems old Fermat was right--
To the margin add 200 pages.
(10/93)
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7.
An Irishman known as Molloy
Said, ``Everyone thinks I'm a goy.
But in fact it's not true,
For I'm really a Jew--
And what's more I'm a girl, not a boy.
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8.
A poet named Sylvia Plath
Lived her life in a jar made of glath.
She's not perfect, it seems;
Her dead Dad haunts her dreams--
And her exit is really a gath.
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9.
Berkeley (Academical)
Our Department they say is the best --
We pass every A.C.E. test.
There ain't none of us lazy,
We publish like crazy--
So how come I'm getting depressed?
(5/84)
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10.
"It's Hereditary, See?"
Bipolar affective disorder
Is an excuse that just won't hold water.
And as your moods swing,
Though you sob or you sing,
You must curse your great-grandfather's daughter.
(4/98)
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11.
In the darkness of deepest Khartoum
Lives a carpetmaker in his room.
His designs are quite fey
(I suspect the man's gay)--
People call him the fruit of the loom.
(4/98)
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12.
You're a gnarled and sardonic old man.
Yes, this too is a part of God's plan.
And if you think that you know
Where you're going to go--
You can wipe that smirk right off your pan.
(4/98)
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13.
A philosopher named Samuel Schnott
Thought he'd proved there exists Lieber Gott:
For such was Schnott's girth
He'd the shape of the Earth.
Coincidence? Most surely not.
(4/98)
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14.
*F*
***
&
UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
ck!!
-- John Cage (1993)
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15.
In Moskva, the parliament -- Duma--
Was swept by a very strange ruma:
All the money that's gone
In this slightly pink dawn
Is hidden in Lenin's old tomb-a.
(4/98)
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16.
There once was a woman so avid,
To make love was always her habid.
Though her husband's a goon
She likes so much to spoon:
Perhaps that's the reason she's gravid.
(4/98)
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17.
A man with a face like a ferret
Has only this redeeming merit:
Though his teeth are quite pointed
And his eyes are disjointed,
His skull is as thick as a turret.
(4/98)
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18.
A crusty curmudgeon called Mort
Emitted an insolent snort.
And he said, in a flash,
``You belong in the trash!
Too bad your mom didn't abort."
(4/98)
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19.
A judge known as Sandra O'Connor,
A woman of learning and honor,
Once roused Warren Burger
To such passionate turgor
That Justice descended upon her.
(1980's)
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20.
The world's shortest limerick:
There once was a fellow named Chuck--
But I need say no more.
(4/98)
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21.
Said an orthodox Hebrew named Rafe,
``I think that this restaurant's unsafe.
The plates are so greasy
That I'm feeling queasy
And half of the menu is traif."
(9/98)
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22.
A desperate fellow named Fitt
Went into the gent's room to sit.
But his squirms in the stall
produced nothing at all --
Except for this fragment of wit.
(10/98)
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23.
(Background: John von Neumann tried to discourage
Alfred Haar from seeking "Haar measure" on the grounds
that no such thing could possibly exist.)
Said a mathematician named Haar,
"Von Neumann can't see very far.
He missed a great treasure --
They call it Haar measure --
Poor Johnny's just not up to par."
(5/99)
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24.
That master of math, Leonhard Euler,
Fell into a steaming hot boiler.
But he didn't panic --
It's hydrodynamic --
The curl of div saved the great toiler.
(5/99)
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25.
The NAME in Vain
Said that Being that we know as Yahweh,
"I've great but not infinite po-weh.
But (I speak not in jest)
This world's only a test --
And the final's in less than an hou-weh."
(5/99)
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26.
A Rabbi, so pious and plain,
Found Kashrut was sometimes a strain.
So away he would steal
For a big Chinese meal:
"Well, `tis just for the veggie chow mein."
(5/99)
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27.
Said Dodgson, "Farewell, Alice Liddell.
Through logic I'll solve my life's riddle.
Stay pure and unharried
And never get married:
The law of the excluded middle."
(7/84)
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28.
There was a smart fellow named Gauss
Whose wife threw him out of the house.
"Damn, you only do math,
You will not take a bath,
And I don't want to see you, you louse!"
(5/00)
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