To
See
A
World
In
A
Grain
Of
Sand

Pied Beauty


GLORY be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

[Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–89). Poems. 1918.]

What is Beauty?...I have been thinking on aesthetics,& Beauty & Creativity, & hence ramble on.......deciding to share with my dear fellow deviants[] some of my favourite examples...I would be honoured & delighted if you would share some of yours...I thought I would dedicate a journal or two to analysing what I find to be Beautiful & Aesthetically pleasing & artistic.....

I love the idea of the small in the large,the microcosm that reflects the world's beauty...William Blake's,"Auguries of Innocence"

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

This is a fascinating imago Mundi...it has always seemed to me a very apt description of the creative artists' task...to find the beauty of the large in the small...not just a flower,but the one supremely beautiful image of a flower that the artist depicts to satisfy the urge to display & present Beauty.

...but this seems to imply perfection?Which can be a type of Beauty...but there is great delight to be found in the imperfect,the odd,the unusual....I love 'Pied Beauty' for this reason;the colours of autumn leaves,the brindled coats of cats,the various never-repeating patterns of the landscape...Hopkins was an artist also,drawn to the beauty of landscape,which he endlessly sketched[following Ruskin's aesthetic principles]..I find him wonderfully inspiring to read,& was encouraged to get out my sketchbooks upon reading:
..."_{In a letter written to Baillie, who was at Oxford with the poet, Hopkins explains how he had been out sketching a good deal. He talks of his sketches of ashes, .... He describes his passion for Nature, blending artist with naturalist. ‘I have particular periods of admiration for particular things in Nature; for a certain time I am astonished at the beauty of a tree, shape, effect, etc. then when the passion, so to speak, has subsided, it is consigned to my treasury of explored beauty, and acknowledged with admiration and interest ever after.’}

...then there is the Beauty of death & decay,of the passage of time...of simplicity & style.I love the Japanese concept of Wabi-Sabi...the Beauty that is found in the imperfect,the decayed,the tarnished & the well-loved.Marks of time & implied transience are celebrated,much as Keats gloried in the perfection of the bud that already foretold death & decay in the rose...
"She dwells with Beauty -- Beauty that must die;"

There is an aesthetic to things that have become more beautiful with use & the passage of time:"

_{Sabi by itself means "the bloom of time." It connotes natural progression-tarnish, hoariness, rust-the extinguished gloss of that which once sparkled. It's the understanding that beauty is fleeting. ... A proverb emerged: "Time is kind to things, but unkind to man."[ -architect Tadao Ando ]}

....hopefully I've encouraged one or two of you to give me suggestions as to what/who you think is aesthetically pleasing or beautiful.......I'm sure they're different to mine?

....

"Darkling I listen; and for many a time
I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Called him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
In such an ecstasy!
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain--
To thy high requiem become a sod..."
[John Keats-Ode To A Nightingale]