One of 100 Thousand Billion Poems
by Raymond Queneau

The wild horse champs the Parthenon's top frieze
For tea cucumber sandwiches a scone
Old corned-beef's rusty armour spreads disease
One gathers rosebuds or grows old alone
O Parthenon you hold the charger's strings
With sombre thoughts they grimly line the nave
Such merchandise a melancholy brings
Through homestead hillside woodland rock and cave
The wolf devours both sheep and shepherdess
In Indian summers Englishmen drink grog
Watching manure and compost coalesce
Lobsters for sale must be our apologue
Suits lisping Spanish tongues for whom say some
A wise loaf always knows its humblest crumb