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At snuff no Cornish sailorman would sneeze
For tea cucumber sandwiches a scone
Old corned-beef's rusty armour spreads disease
One gathers rosebuds or grows old alone
To one sweet hour of bliss my memory clings
When flame a form to wrath ancestral gave
Such merchandise a melancholy brings
To break a rule Britannia's might might waive
When dried the terrapin can naught express
A bird-brain banquet melts bold Mistress Mog
The colonel's still escutcheoned in undress
No need to cart such treasures from the fog
Poor reader smile before your lips go numb
In cognac brandy is Bacardi rum?


Raymond Queneau

Translation to English by Stanley Chapman
found in "Oulipo Compendium"
Atlas 1998, ISBN 0-947757-96-1

Idea and implementation by Magnus Bodin 1997
Produced in the wonderful country of Sweden.