100,000,000,000,000 poems

The acid tongue with gourmet's expertise
Licks round carved marble chops on snails full-blown
The understanding critic firstly sees
That suede ferments is not at all well known
To one sweet hour of bliss my memory clings
Were pots graffiti'd over by a slave
Such merchandise a melancholy brings
Etruscan words which Greece and Rome engrave
The genealogist with field and fess
With gravity at gravity's great cog
Poor Yorick comes to bury not address
Whiskey will always wake an Irish bog
Where no one bothered how one warmed one's bum
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.