Michael Drayton begins his sonnet sequence by showing readers the door if they’ve come for heartfelt passion. He tells them plainly: put the book down and find another, one that better satisfies a taste for lovesick sighs. His own breast, he insists, will never be wounded by a single far-fetched sigh; love won’t wring a tear from his eye, and you won’t catch him dressing up sonnets in pitiful “Ah me’s.” He’s announcing a different kind of speaker—a libertine who sings with a fantastic, unapologetic lightness.
The mood is playful, almost teasing, as he explains that his verse mirrors his restless mind, always in motion and hungry for change. Inclined to variety, he ranges sportively through every humour. His Muse, he claims with a wink, is thoroughly English: incapable of sticking to one fashion for long. Rather than promising emotional depth, the opening offers a lively, shifting performance, inviting us into poems that will dart from mood to mood without ever settling into predictable sonnet melancholy.