ABSTRACT
In A Defence of Poetry, Shelley refers to Power or its operation, as the poet's apprehension of a 'certain rhythm and order', as the poetic faculty, as 'eternal music' and as 'that imperial faculty, whose throne is curtained within the invisible nature of man'. Shelley's desire to be desired by Power establishes a fantasy formation within his writing that confers upon him the poet's everlasting vision and insight. The poet's relationship with Power, the 'imperial faculty' seated on a 'curtained throne within the invisible nature of man', provides coveted access to 'eternal' or 'planetary' music, but it also promotes the reproduction of that music through the poet's words and measures. Shelley's use of words such as 'enlarge', 'distend' and 'circumference' implies that readers and poets have a center and that poetry acts centrifugally as it extends the individual's boundaries out to extraordinary limits, perhaps even to unlimited horizons.
