Limericks and Poetry about Moby Dick

A novel steeped in symbolism and drenched in mythology, Moby Dick is always a fertile place to turn for a little poetic inspiration. Although oftentimes impenetrable like Ulysses, Melville’s story of the hunt for the great white whale tells the story of a bold and perilous adventure through the dark waters of the human psyche.

The quest for the whale is also the quest for God, the struggle to grasp the ungraspable and to comprehend the incomprehensible. What I hear Melville saying is that we cannot come to terms with God (or whatever name you prefer to ascribe to the underpinning of metaphysical reality) until we’ve accepted the fact that God exceeds all categories of understanding and defies every attempt at a definition.

     Moby Dick
     Old Ahab could teach us a valuable lesson
     The one thing he wanted escaped his possession
               The crew he recruited
               All died in pursuit of
     The meaning of life: the impossible question

     Lost Sailors
     Odysseus, Ishmael, set sail on their own
     Ungrounded, uncertain, on saltwater foam 
                So see how they shift
                In their vessels adrift
     As the four winds deliver them light years from home

A Jungian reading of “Moby Dick”

The following poem, obviously not a limerick, erupted out of my subconsciousness sometime after reading Malcolm Lowry’s Under the Volcano, the cryptic story of one man’s alcoholic binge in southern Mexico. I had also been thinking a lot about Moby Dick at that time, and going through a lengthy phase in which I interpreted everything I read or saw through the lens of Carl Jung’s depth psychology.

The essence of the Jungian reading is that each character in a story or myth is meant to depict a distinct character, but a different aspect (or archetype) within a single mind. Every individual is comprised of multiple voices, and at any given time, a different character will take the helm. It may be the outspoken warrior, the soft spoken victim, the unruly beast, and so on. And you’ll find me exploring this theme in many of limericks.

I make a panoply of references to literature, mythology and heavy drinking in this poem, but they all circle back to that insatiable appetite for meaning that sometimes drives us to madness. Perhaps you can read it as a sort of shouting match between one inner voice who believes there’s an inherent meaning to human existence, and another voice who insists that there’s none.

     Out of my Depth

     Shaking my head as I shuffle through Nod
     And wander through darkness on scabrous old feet
     Where the fruits are forbidden, and might I add strictly
     But the knowledge is ever so sweet

     I’m Under the Influence of sir Malcolm L
     And M. L. von Franz has me under her spell
     Seeking the change that I wish I could be
     While my dear inner Ahab I struggle to quell

     To search by escaping through tropics and trenches
     Determined to make every ocean my home
     My singular purpose: the potion that quenches
     Still I drink that I could theme alone

     In this watering hole will I bury my hatchets
     A sickness that’s cured is an ailment forgotten
     So choke every sorrow and drown your regrets
     A soul that remembers is cursed to go rotten

     With penalties and interest forever compounded 
     I’m astounded to watch how my recollection grows
     The proverbial wisdom that’s also called madness
     Is purchased on credit and paid for with woes 

     Drifting asea to steer clear of collectors
     Engulfed instead by tempests my own
     Echoing voices demanding comeuppance
     From the depth comes a cry that disturbs every bone

     These howling reminders are issued below
     From under the surface by more than a beast 
     My pirates on deck keep me bound to the mast
     Always in earshot and never released

     Mostly a head but with hardly a face
     My nemesis, massive, can scarcely be seen
     Not to be measured through time or in space
     From his cousins’ cadavers our data we glean

     Less than a man, I stomp on my stump
     And promise to silence the primitive brute
     Guided by starlight, unable to sleep
     Harpoon at the ready and eager to shoot

     Damn the torpedoes and to hell with the crew
     Set sail at once for the wide open blue
     Don’t be seduced by this monster in white
     His message is wicked, no less than it’s true

     He feeds on your anger, you’re never too old
     To listen instead of exerting your tongue
     Or shaking the hinges of Davy Jones’ locker
     On the floor of the ocean where Melville met Jung

One more limerick about Moby Dick

In the following limerick, I tried to capture the symbol of the white whale, as a metaphor for God, the ground of all being, and the great unknowable.

     The Way of the White Whale
     The whale is a fish and a mammal in one
     As white has all colors and also has none
               The grandest of creatures
               With paradox features
     Unknown and untouched by the light of the sun

Further reading

If you’ve enjoyed these limericks and poetry about Moby Dick, please share your thoughts in the comments. You also want to check out some of the following collections:

• Limericks about James Joyce and Ulysses
• Limericks about Jungian Depth Psychology
• 9 Penetrating Limericks about Dostoyevsky
• Edifying Limericks about American Literature
• Limericks about Fairy Tales