100,000,000,000,000 poems

When one with t'other straightaway agrees
Through snobbish growing round her hemline zone
Replies like this the dumbstruck brain may tease
Which neither time nor tide can long postpone
How it suprised us pale grey underlings
Were pots graffiti'd over by a slave
Such merchandise a melancholy brings
Thou homestead hillside woodland rock and cave
The peasants's skirts on rainy days she'd tress
A piercint wit would sprightliest horses flog
While homeward thirsts to each quenched glass say yes
With breaking voice across the Alps they slog
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.