100,000,000,000,000 poems

The acid tongue with gourmet's expertise
Since Elgin left his nostrils in the stone
Replies like this the dumbstruck brain may tease
'Ere meanings new to ancient tribes are thrown
The roundabout eats profits made on swings
Rejecting ermine to become a knave
The learning linguist cameramaniac sings
Etruscan words which Greece and Rome engrave
The wolf devours both sheep and shepherdess
With gravity at gravity's great cog
To prove mamma an adult with a tress
One misses cricket hearth and croaking frog
Ventriloquists be blowed you strike me dumb
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.