Romantic Poetry WebQuest
John Keats (1795-1821)
1O soft embalmer of the still midnight,
2 Shutting, with careful fingers and benign,
3Our gloom-pleas'd eyes, embower'd from the light,
4 Enshaded in forgetfulness divine:
5O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close
6 In midst of this thine hymn my willing eyes,
7Or wait the "Amen," ere thy poppy throws
8 Around my bed its lulling charities.
9Then save me, or the passed day will shine
10Upon my pillow, breeding many woes,--
11 Save me from curious Conscience, that still lords
12Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole;
13 Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,
14And seal the hushed Casket of my Soul.
Notes
1] First published in a Plymouth newspaper (1838). It had been copied into a journal letter to George Keats on April 30, 1819.
13] wards: parts of a lock.