Bob Rae’s Farewell to the Leadership

A poised, witty and quintessentially statesman-like Bob Rae announced that he was not running for leadership of the Liberal Party today with this Shakespearean sonnet:

Let those who are in favour with their stars
Of public honour and proud titles boast,
Whilst I, whom fortune of such triumph bars
Unlook’d for joy in that I honour most.
Great princes’ favourites their fair leaves spread
But as the marigold at the sun’s eye,
And in themselves their pride lies buried,
For at a frown they in their glory die.
The painful warrior famoused for fight,
After a thousand victories once foiled,
Is from the book of honour razed quite,
And all the rest forgot for which he toiled:
   Then happy I, that love and am beloved,
     Where I may not remove nor be removed.

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