100,000,000,000,000 poems

The marble tomb gapes wide with jangling keys
The bull's horns ought to dry it like a bone
Old corned-beef's rusty armour spreads disease
And empty cages show life's bird has flown
Oh how oh how he hates such pilferings
The North Wind Bites into his architrave
Proud death quite il-le-gi-ti-mate-ly stings
Victorious worms grind all into the grave
Platonic Greece was not so talentless
Shallots and sharks'fins face the smould'ring log
To prove mamma an adult with a tress
With breaking voice across the Alps they slog
The Taj Mahal has trinkets spice and gum
The best of all things to an end must come


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.