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- 1816
- TO SLEEP
- by John Keats
-
- O soft embalmer of the still midnight,
- Shutting with careful fingers and benign
- Our gloom-pleas'd eyes, embower'd from the light,
- Enshaded in forgetfulness divine:
- O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close
- 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 passed day will shine
- Upon my pillow, breeding many woes;
- Save me from curious conscience, that still lords
- Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole;
- Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,
- And seal the hushed casket of my soul.
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- THE END
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