Britten: Serenade for tenor, horn & strings, Op. 31 - Sonnet - Peter Pears, Dennis Brain, New Symphony Orchestra

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 passèd day will shine

Upon my pillow, breeding many woes

Save me, 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