The canonical example of the nonsense poem, and one that should be instantly familiar.

Although other poets had attempted nonsense verse before Edward Lear, his poetry really defined the genre. Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of his work is the way the incongruity remains fresh no matter how many times you read it… it’s not that easy at all to write nonsense that sticks in the mind :-)

I’m not really sure whether I should even bother commenting about the today’s poem as a poem - after all, it’s not meant to have any meaning or deeper significance¹. But I will make one comment on structure: note how utterly simple the versification is; always engaging, always musical, yet never complex enough to distract attention from the ‘action’, as it were. Again, this makes Lear’s accomplishment all the more remarkable - he has to create his nonsensical effect without resorting to any sort of gobbledygook or jargon (T S Eliot, are you listening?).

— Thomas

Surprisingly enough, there aren’t a whole lot of Lear sites out there; this one’s the best I could find:
http://www2.pair.com/mgraz/Lear/index.html

Trivia

This poem is the source of that most lovely word, ‘runcible’:

Main Entry: runcible spoon

Pronunciation: ‘r&n(t)-s&-b&l-

Function: noun

Etymology: coined with an obscure meaning by Edward Lear Date: 1871

a sharp-edged fork with three broad curved prongs

– Merriam-Webster

Now there’s immortality for you!

Biography

   b. May 12, 1812, Highgate, near London
   d. Jan. 29, 1888, San Remo, Italy

English landscape painter who is more widely known as the writer of an original kind of nonsense verse and as the popularizer of the limerick. His true genius is apparent in his nonsense poems, which portray a world of fantastic creatures in nonsense words and show a Tennysonian feeling for word colour, variety of rhythm, and often a deep underlying sense of melancholy. Their quality is matched, especially in the limericks, by that of his engaging pen-and-ink drawings.

The youngest of 21 children, he was brought up by his eldest sister, Ann, and from the age of 15 earned his living by drawing. He subsequently worked for the British Museum, made drawings of birds for John Gould, a zoologist, and, during 1832-37, made illustrations of the Earl of Derby’s private menagerie at Knowsley, Lancashire. Lear had a natural affinity for children, and it was for the earl’s grandchildren that he produced his first Book of Nonsense (1846, enlarged 1861, 1863). In 1835 he decided to become a topographical landscape painter.

Lear, a homosexual, suffered all his life from epilepsy and melancholia. After 1837 he lived mainly abroad. Though naturally timid, he was a constant and intrepid traveler, exploring Italy, Greece, Albania, Palestine, Syria, Egypt, and, later, India and Ceylon. An indefatigable worker, he produced innumerable pen and watercolour sketches of great topographical accuracy. He worked these up into the carefully finished watercolours and large oil paintings, showing Pre-Raphaelite influence, that were his financial mainstay. During his nomadic life he lived, among other places, at Rome, Corfu, and, finally, with his celebrated cat “Foss,” at San Remo.

Lear published three volumes of bird and animal drawings; seven illustrated travel books (notably Journal of a Landscape Painter in Greece and Albania, 1851); and four books of nonsense–The Book of Nonsense mentioned earlier, Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany and Alphabets (1871), More Nonsense, Pictures, Rhymes, Botany, etc. (1872), and Laughable Lyrics (1877). A posthumous collection, Queery Leary Nonsense (1911), was compiled by Lady Strachey.