A RIVERLANDER’S ability to see the funnier side to life saw him win a poetry contest against more than 150 entrants recently.
Renmark man Terry Marter recently won a worldwide online poetry competition focused on constructing humorous limericks.
Mr Marter said it was his second time entering the fortnightly competition, which was hosted on the website Mad Kane’s Humor Blog.
“I had been writing a few over a couple of months and I just thought I would have a look online,” he said.
“They run a fortnightly competition with a different theme or word that you’ve got to use.
“The first one I entered I was in a half dozen honourable mentions, out of about 150 entries, then the next fortnight I won it.
“Because it’s online anyone can enter.”
Mr Marter said he enjoyed the “challenge” of limerick structure, in which the first, second and fifth lines of a poem must end with a separate rhyme to the third and fourth.
“(There’s) a kind of discipline in that you’ve got to stick to a certain rhythm… there’s a bit of wiggle room, but it’s got to stick to that 12/8 rhythm,” he said.
“When you have an idea, the hard part is getting it to fit into five lines, and to get the right number of syllables to fit the rhythm.
“Often you get a problem where the emphasis can end up on the wrong syllable in a word… so you’ve got to try and re-word it.”
Mr Marter – who is also a locally renowned photography and snooker enthusiast – said writing the limericks had provided a distraction from circumstances surrounding COVID-19.
“I’ve always known what limericks are but I’ve never done a lot with them, then over the last two months I’ve been writing them when I’ve had an idea come into my head,” he said.
“With some you get an idea and you can come up with a result fairly easily, then others you can spend an hour or two on.
“I’ve got about 80 I’ve done now.”