The Irrawaddy River or Ayeyarwady River (, , also spelt Ayeyarwaddy) is a river that flows from north to south through Myanmar. It is the country's largest river and most important commercial waterway. Originating from the confluence of the N'mai and Mali rivers, it flows relatively straight North-South before emptying through the Irrawaddy Delta into the Andaman Sea. Its drainage basin of about covers a large part of Burma. After Rudyard Kipling's poem, it is sometimes referred to as 'The Road to Mandalay'.