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From playboy Chance the nymph no longer flees
Through snobbish growing round her hemline zone
His toga rumpled high above his knees
While sharks to let's say potted shrimps are prone
Oh how oh how he hates such pilferings
Nought can the mouse's timid nibbling stave
Proud death quite il-le-gi-ti-mate-ly stings
For burning bushes never fish forgave
The peasants's skirts on rainy days she'd tress
With quill white-collared through his life will jog
Watching manure and compost coalesce
One misses cricket hearth and croaking frog
Though bretzels take the dols from board-room drum
For Europe's glory while Fate's harpies strum


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.