Page:Poems by Isaac Rosenberg (1922).djvu/73



Fine! Fine! See, in my brain What madmen have rushed through And like a tornado Torn up the tight roots Of some dead universe: The old clay is broken For a power to soak in and knit It all into tougher tissues To hold life; Pricking my nerves till the brain might crack It boils to my finger-tips, Till my hands ache to grip The hammer—the lone hammer That breaks lives into a road Through which my genius drives. Pharaoh well peruked and oiled, And your admirable pyramids, And your interminable procession Of crowded kings, You are my little fishing rods Wherewith I catch the fish To suit my hungry belly. I am rough now, and new, and will have no tailor.