Sonnet Xxv: O Why Should Nature

Michael Drayton

O why should Nature niggardly restrain
That foreign nations relish not our tongue?
Else should my lines glide on the waves of Rhene
And crown the Pyrens with my living song.
But, bounded thus, to Scotland get you forth,
Thence take you wing unto the Orcades;
There let my verse get glory in the North,
Making my sighs to thaw the frozen seas;
And let the Bards within that Irish isle,
To whom my Muse with fiery wing shall pass,
Call back the stiff-neck'd rebels from exile,
And mollify the slaught'ring Gallowglass;
And when my flowing numbers they rehearse,
Let wolves and bears be charmed with my verse.

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