The hammer and anvil,
My tools of Creation,
Have yet to serve their full potential.
Every day, I wield them.
From the depths of my heart and soul,
I muster the strength to forge.
The strength is abundant,
But such strength is thunder
Without proper restraint.

The fault is not my loyal tools –
Certainly not –
It is my own.
It is my hands –
My frail, limp hands –
Hands that can hold a gentle rose
Or caress a snow-white cheek.
Strength is unneeded there.
I am safe among the fields,
Comforted by the embrace of the flowers.

Every evening, I took a tulip
And by the stem, plucked it.
O, the beauty!
The beauty I held in my hands!
The same hands of Promethean might
Could too hold a budding flower.

But Master scowled at me.
He punished me for my hands –
My weak, pathetic hands.
“You must be stronger,” he barks,
“Lift the hammer above your head,
And bring it down with might!
Stoke the fire! Keep it burning!
You must be stronger! Keep working!”

My hands would burn, but still I worked;
Master’s words rang in my skull.
And how they would redden and swell!
With every blow, I yearned for the embrace again
As my gears clicked together
And the machine slammed the anvil.

One evening prior, I fled to the fields
And tried to hide from Master.
While among the tulips, I plucked just one,
And the stem broke in two,
Graying and withering.
Now a corpse in my hand –
Hand of iron and lead –
It is without purpose.
I searched for others to place in its stead,
But all wilted in the iron grasp.