100,000,000,000,000 poems

At five precisely out went La Marquise
Licks round carved marble chops on snails full-blown
His toga rumpled high above his knees
And empty cages show life's bird has flown
The frisian Isles my friends are cherised things
Whose ocean still-born herrings madly brave
The fertile mother changelings drops like kings
Etruscan words which Greece and Rome engrave
The genealogist with field and fess
One tongue will do to keep the verse agog
To prove mamma an adult with a tress
Southern baroque's seductive dialogue
With marble souvenirs then fill a slum
And lessors' dates have all too short a sum


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.