My Two Geniuses

I.     One is a slow and melancholy maid;     I know riot if she cometh from the skies     Or from the sleepy gulfs, but she will rise     Often before me in the twilight shade,     Holding a bunch of poppies and a blade     Of springing wheat: prostrate my body lies     Before her on the turf, the while she ties     A fillet of the weed about my head;     And in the gaps of sleep I seem to hear     A gentle rustle like the stir of corn,     And words like odours thronging to my ear:     "Lie still, beloved--still until the morn;     Lie still with me upon this rolling sphere--     Still till the judgment; thou art faint and worn."     II.     The other meets me in the public throng;     Her hair streams backward from her loose attire;     She hath a trumpet and an eye of fire;     She points me downward, steadily and long:--     "There is thy grave--arise, my son, be strong!     Hands are upon thy crown--awake, aspire     To immortality; heed not the lyre     Of the Enchantress, nor her poppy-song,     But in the stillness of the summer calm     Tremble for what is Godlike in thy being.     Listen a while, and thou shall hear the psalm     Of victory sung by creatures past thy seeing;     And from far battle-fields there comes the neighing     Of dreadful onset, though the air is balm."     III.     Maid with the poppies, must I let thee go?     Alas, I may not; thou art likewise dear!     I am but human, and thou hast a tear     When she hath nought but splendour, and the glow     Of a wild energy that mocks the flow     Of the poor sympathies which keep us here:     Lay past thy poppies, and come twice as near,     And I will teach thee, and thou too shalt grow;     And thou shalt walk with me in open day     Through the rough thoroughfares with quiet grace;     And the wild-visaged maid shall lead the way,     Timing her footsteps to a gentler pace     As her great orbs turn ever on thy face,     Drinking in draughts of loving help alway.