100,000,000,000,000 poems

From playboy Chance the nymph no longer flees
Licks round carved marble chops on snails full-blown
Old corned-beef's rusty armour spreads disease
One gathers rosebuds or grows old alone
How it suprised us pale grey underlings
That metred rhyme alone can souls enslave
A daring baron pockets precious Mings
To break a rule Britannia's might might waive
Staunch pilgrims longest journeys can't depress
And starve the sniveling baby like a dog
Poor Yorick comes to bury not address
No need to cart such treasures from the fog
The Taj Mahal has trinkets spice and gum
A wise loaf always knows its humblest crumb


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.