Today from the Oulipost Project bag of tricks:
Imagine a prisoner whose supply of paper is restricted. To put it to fullest use, he will maximize his space by avoiding any letter extending above or below the line (b, d,f,g,h,j,k,l,p,q,t and y) and use only a,c,e,i, m,n,o,r,s,u,v,w,x and z. Compose a poem using only words that can be made from these letters AND which you source from your newspaper text.
I chose two interesting articles, one from the Arts section, a movie review of Sweet Dreams, and from the Business Section, a piece on 10 rules of Roman armies. Didn’t work out quite as planned. Of course I didn’t realize that neither Sweet nor Dreams was going to make the cut. Not sure why I missed that! When I had my poem almost done, I also realized the tool I used had let some “d” words slip through, so rewarded, and, and commander had to go.
Here is my rather strange poem, not a topic I’d normally choose, for sure.
Bust of Julius Caesar from the British Museum (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Caesar’s Armies Win
Roman armies arrive
across rivers,
survive sea massacres,
one or more memories
as men serve Caesar.
Armies win wars, women
and even ice cream
in various versions.
CAS April 15, 2014
It’s the picture of Italian ice-cream in a shop of Rome, Italy (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
SOURCES:
Stone, Jay Movie review: Sweet Dreams shows Rwandan healing, through ice cream, Ottawa Citizen print edition April 15, 2014 (C5)
Cherniak, Brad, Roman army’s secret weapons still powerful, Financial Post, Ottawa Citizen print edition, April 15, 2014 (D4)
Related articles
Quillfyre 
I had to laugh as you segued smoothly into ice cream. You didn’t bat a lash did you?!
not a one. I figured a suitable reward to me for having to write a poem about armies!
What flavour would Caesar favour?
lol Massimo. I imagine not very many flavours in his day. Probably a fruit flavour. Maybe lemon! Caesar would savour lemon flavour.
Hopefully not garum ice cream! (http://pompeii-food-and-drink.org/garum.htm)
You have to start another poem with that like – “Caesar would favour lemon flavour”!
Oh, Massimo, I agree! Sounds dreadful!
I enjoyed this – “Alia iacta est” is a commonplace phrase in my household.
I would change the line to Caesar would savour lemon flavour to pick up the double sibilant of Caesar and savour, but then you are right there is the double f sound of favour and flavour…. oh the choices we must make!