Sonnets: Idea XVI An Allusion To The Phoenix

'Mongst all the creatures in this spacious round
    Of the birds' kind, the phoenix is alone,
    Which best by you of living things is known;
None like to that, none like to you is found!
Your beauty is the hot and splend'rous sun;
    The precious spices be your chaste desire,
    Which being kindled by that heavenly fire,
Your life, so like the phoenix's begun.
Yourself thus burnèd in that sacred flame,
    With so rare sweetness all the heavens perfuming;
    Again increasing as you are consuming,
Only by dying born the very same.
    And winged by fame you to the stars ascend;
    So you of time shall live beyond the end.

Michael Drayton

Michael Drayton was an English poet who produced a variety of work, including historical poems, sonnets, and a vast poem on the geography of England. His most significant contribution to poetry is the long historical epic "Poly-Olbion" which describes the topography and history of England and Wales. Drayton's poetry often reflects his staunch patriotism and deep scholarly interest in English history.

Michael Drayton

Amour 44

Michael Drayton, Simple Poetry

Sonnets: Idea VI

Michael Drayton, Simple Poetry

Sonnets: Idea XXXVII

Michael Drayton, Simple Poetry

Vpon The Death Of Mistris Elianor Fallowfield

Michael Drayton, Simple Poetry

English

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Amour 6

In one whole world is but one Phoenix found,
A Phoenix thou, this Phoenix then alone:
By thy rare plume thy kind is easly knowne,
With heauenly colours dide, with natures wonder cround.
Heape thine own vertues, seasoned by their sunne,
On heauenly top of thy diuine desire;
Then with thy beautie set the same on fire,
So by thy death thy life shall be begunne.
Thy selfe, thus burned in this sacred flame,
With thine owne sweetnes al the heauens perfuming,
And stil increasing as thou art consuming,
Shalt spring againe from th' ashes of thy fame;
    And mounting vp shall to the heauens ascend:
    So maist thou liue, past world, past fame, past end.

Michael Drayton

Sonnets: Idea LVI An Allusion To The Eaglets

When like an eaglet I first found my love,
For that the virtue I thereof would know,
Upon the nest I set it forth to prove
If it were of that kingly kind or no;
    But it no sooner saw my sun appear,
But on her rays with open eyes it stood,
To show that I had hatched it for the air,
And rightly came from that brave mounting brood;
    And when the plumes were summed with sweet desire,
To prove the pinions it ascends the skies;
Do what I could, it needsly would aspire
To my soul's sun, those two celestial eyes.
    Thus from my breast, where it was bred alone,
    It after thee is like an eaglet flown.

Michael Drayton

Sonnets: Idea LXII

When first I ended, then I first began;
Then more I travelled further from my rest.
Where most I lost, there most of all I won;
Pinèd with hunger, rising from a feast.
    Methinks I fly, yet want I legs to go,
Wise in conceit, in act a very sot,
Ravished with joy amidst a hell of woe,
What most I seem that surest am I not.
    I build my hopes a world above the sky,
Yet with the mole I creep into the earth;
In plenty I am starved with penury,
And yet I surfeit in the greatest dearth.
    I have, I want, despair, and yet desire,
    Burned in a sea of ice, and drowned amidst a fire.

Michael Drayton

Sonnets: Idea IV

Bright star of beauty, on whose eyelids sit
A thousand nymph-like and enamoured graces,
The goddesses of memory and wit,
Which there in order take their several places;
    In whose dear bosom, sweet delicious love
Lays down his quiver which he once did bear,
Since he that blessèd paradise did prove,
And leaves his mother's lap to sport him there
    Let others strive to entertain with words
My soul is of a braver mettle made;
I hold that vile which vulgar wit affords;
In me's that faith which time cannot invade.
    Let what I praise be still made good by you;
    Be you most worthy whilst I am most true!

Michael Drayton

Sonnets: Idea LVII

You best discerned of my mind's inward eyes,
And yet your graces outwardly divine,
Whose dear remembrance in my bosom lies,
Too rich a relic for so poor a shrine;
    You, in whom nature chose herself to view,
When she her own perfection would admire;
Bestowing all her excellence on you,
At whose pure eyes Love lights his hallowed fire;
    Even as a man that in some trance hath seen
More than his wond'ring utterance can unfold,
That rapt in spirit in better worlds hath been,
So must your praise distractedly be told;
    Most of all short when I would show you most,
    In your perfections so much am I lost.

Michael Drayton

Sonnets: Idea XLIV

Whilst thus my pen strives to eternise thee,
Age rules my lines with wrinkles in my face,
Where in the map of all my misery
Is modelled out the world of my disgrace;
    Whilst in despite of tyrannising times,
Medea-like, I make thee young again,
Proudly thou scorn'st my world-outwearing rhymes,
And murther'st virtue with thy coy disdain;
    And though in youth my youth untimely perish,
To keep thee from oblivion and the grave,
Ensuing ages yet my rhymes shall cherish,
Where I intombed my better part shall save;
    And though this earthly body fade and die,
    My name shall mount upon eternity.

Michael Drayton