Articles and Commentaries by Aden Lee, Skylark Press Studio Shelley's Skylark | Page 16

With this minor embellishment, Shelley touts his poetic
skill by suggesting that his masterful poem was produced
extemporaneously, completed within the span of time he
listened to the skylark.
True art disguises its own artifice. Given Shelley’s praise of
the skylark’s “unpremediated art”, it is no surprise that he
desired to make his poem (produced with much labor, I am
sure) seem as natural and spontaneous as the skylark’s
song.
Shelley ends his poem on a tranquil, meditative note, as the
grandness of his vision yields before an image of one man
standing amidst the groves, mesmerized by the exuberant
twittering of an unseen singer.
For your reading pleasure, the entirety of Shelley’s poem is
reproduced here:

© Skylark Press Studio 2016

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