100,000,000,000,000 poems

When one with t'other straightaway agrees
When masons clutch the breath we held on loan
Old corned-beef's rusty armour spreads disease
With cherry-pips his cottage floor is sown
The roundabout eats profits made on swings
Whose ocean still-born herrings madly brave
Proud death quite il-le-gi-ti-mate-ly stings
In purest cradels tha's how they behave
Emboggled minds may puff and blow and guess
One tongue will do to keep the verse agog
Poor Yorick comes to bury not address
With breaking voice across the Alps they slog
Poor reader smile before your lips go numb
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.