100,000,000,000,000 poems

The wild horse champs the Parthenon's top frieze
When masons clutch the breath we held on loan
The showman gargles fire and sword with ease
With cherry-pips his cottage floor is sown
How it suprised us pale grey underlings
Nought can the mouse's timid nibbling stave
He's gone to London how the echo rings
In purest cradels tha's how they behave
The fasting fakir doesn't smell the less
A piercint wit would sprightliest horses flog
While homeward thirsts to each quenched glass say yes
With breaking voice across the Alps they slog
Suits lisping Spanish tongues for whom say some
In cognac brandy is Bacardi rum?


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.