Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, BRITANNIA'S PASTORALS: BOOK 1. THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY TO LORD ZOUCH, by WILLIAM BROWNE (1591-1643)


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BRITANNIA'S PASTORALS: BOOK 1. THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY TO LORD ZOUCH, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Honour's bright ray
Last Line: A pyramis built to thy memory.
Alternate Author Name(s): Browne, William Of Tavistock
Subject(s): Great Britain; Zouch, Edward, Lord (1556-1625)


HONOUR'S bright ray,
More highly crown'd with virtue than with years,
Pardon a rustic Muse that thus appears
In shepherd's grey,
Entreating your attention to a lay
Fitting a sylvan bower, not courtly trains;
Such choicer ears,
Should have Apollo's priests, not Pan's rude swains.
But if the music of contented plains
A thought uprears
For your approvement of that part she bears,
When time (that embryons to perfection brings)
Hath taught her strains
May better boast their being from the spring
Where brave heroës' worths the Sisters sing:
(In lines whose reigns
In spite of Envy and her restless pains
Be unconfin'd as blest eternity:)
The vales shall ring
Thy honour'd name, and every song shall be
A pyramis built to thy memory.





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