Asleep! O Sleep A Little While, White Pearl!

Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl!
And let me kneel, and let me pray to thee,
And let me call Heavens blessing on thine eyes,
And let me breathe into the happy air,
That doth enfold and touch thee all about,
Vows of my slavery, my giving up,
My sudden adoration, my great love!

John Keats

John Keats was an English Romantic poet who is among the most beloved of all English poets. His work is characterized by sensual imagery, most notably in his series of odes. Though his poems were not generally well-received by critics during his lifetime, his reputation grew posthumously. Keats’ work, such as "Ode to a Nightingale", and "To Autumn", has had a lasting effect on many writers and artists. He died at the young age of 25 from tuberculosis.

John Keats

Sonnet: Written On A Blank Page In Shakespeare's Poems, Facing 'A Lover's Complaint'

John Keats, Simple Poetry

Lines To Fanny

John Keats, Simple Poetry

Fragment: Where's The Poet?

John Keats, Simple Poetry

To Charles Cowden Clarke

John Keats, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Sonnet To Sleep

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 hoards
Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole;
Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,
And seal the hushed casket of my soul.

John Keats

Extracts From An Opera

O! were I one of the Olympian twelve,
Their godships should pass this into law,
That when a man doth set himself in toil
After some beauty veiled far away,
Each step he took should make his lady's hand
More soft, more white, and her fair cheek more fair;
And for each briar-berry he might eat,
A kiss should bud upon the tree of love,
And pulp and ripen richer every hour,
To melt away upon the traveller's lips.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

1.
The sun, with his great eye,
Sees not so much as I;
And the moon, all silve-proud,
Might as well be in a cloud.

2.
And O the spring the spring!
I lead the life of a king!
Couch'd in the teeming grass,
I spy each pretty lass.

3.
I look where no one dares,
And I st...

John Keats

Song: Hush, Hush! Tread Softly!

1

Hush, hush! tread softly! hush, hush my dear!
All the house is asleep, but we know very well
That the jealous, the jealous old bald-pate may hear.
Tho' you've padded his night-cap O sweet Isabel!
Tho' your feet are more light than a Fairy's feet,
Who dances on bubbles where brooklets meet,
Hush, hush! soft tiptoe! hush, hush my dear!
For less than a nothing the jealous can hear.

2

No leaf doth tremble, no ripple is there
On the river, all's still, and the night's sleepy eye
Closes up, and forgets all its Lethean care,
Charm'd to death by the drone of the humming May-fly;
And the Moon, whether prudish or complaisant,
Hath fled to her bower, well knowing I want
No light in the dusk, no torch in the gloom,
But my Isabel's eyes, and her li...

John Keats

A Prophecy : To George Keats In America

'Tis the witching hour of night,
Orbed is the moon and bright,
And the stars they glisten, glisten,
Seeming with bright eyes to listen,
For what listen they?
For a song and for a charm,
See they glisten in alarm,
And the moon is waxing warm
To hear what I shall say.
Moon! keep wide thy golden ears,
Hearken, stars! and hearken, spheres!
Hearken, thou eternal sky!
I sing an infant's lullaby,
A pretty lullaby.
Listen, listen, listen, listen,
Glisten, glisten, glisten, glisten,
And hear my lullaby!
Though the rushes that will make
Its cradle still are in the lake,
Though the linen that will be
Its swathe, is on the cotton tree,
Though the woollen that will keep
It warm, is on the silly sheep,
Listen, starlight, listen, listen,

John Keats

To -----

Think not of it, sweet one, so;
Give it not a tear;
Sigh thou mayst, and bid it go
Any, any where.


Do not look so sad, sweet one,
Sad and fadingly;
Shed one drop then, it is gone,
O 'twas born to die!


Still so pale? then, dearest, weep;
Weep, I'll count the tears,
And each one shall be a bliss
For thee in after years.


Brighter has it left thine eyes
Than a sunny rill;
And thy whispering melodies
Are tenderer still.


Yet, as all things mourn awhile
At fleeting blisses,
E'en let us too! but be our dirge
A dirge of kisses.

John Keats

Ode To Fanny

1.

Physician Nature! Let my spirit blood!
O ease my heart of verse and let me rest;
Throw me upon thy Tripod, till the flood
Of stifling numbers ebbs from my full breast.
A theme! a theme! great nature! give a theme;
Let me begin my dream.
I come I see thee, as thou standest there,
Beckon me not into the wintry air.

2.

Ah! dearest love, sweet home of all my fears,
And hopes, and joys, and panting miseries,
To-night, if I may guess, thy beauty wears
A smile of such delight,
As brilliant and as bright,
As when with ravished, aching, vassal eyes,
Lost in soft amaze,
I gaze, I gaze!

3.

Who now, with greedy looks, eats up my feast?
What stare outfaces now my silver moon!
Ah! keep that hand unravished at the lea...

John Keats