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The marble tomb gapes wide with jangling keys
The bull's horns ought to dry it like a bone
He bent right down and well what did he seize
And loudly sang off-key without a tone
To one sweet hour of bliss my memory clings
Whose ocean still-born herrings madly brave
The fertile mother changelings drops like kings
Thou homestead hillside woodland rock and cave
Emboggled minds may puff and blow and guess
Shallots and sharks'fins face the smould'ring log
Watching manure and compost coalesce
With breaking voice across the Alps they slog
Where no one bothered how one warmed one's bum
They're kings we're mammal-cousins hi ho hum


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.