Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
John Keats. 17951821636. To Sleep
O SOFT embalmer of the still midnight! | |
Shutting with careful fingers and benign | |
Our gloom-pleased eyes, embower’d from the light, | |
Enshaded in forgetfulness divine; | |
O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close, | 5 |
In midst of this thine hymn, my willing eyes, | |
Or wait the amen, ere thy poppy throws | |
Around my bed its lulling charities; | |
Then save me, or the passèd day will shine | |
Upon my pillow, breeding many woes; | 10 |
Save me from curious conscience, that still lords | |
Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole; | |
Turn the key deftly in the oilèd wards, | |
And seal the hushèd casket of my soul. |