Beauty is found in the banal and habitual:
Visiting Dutch, though intrigued, aren’t enamoured
Of the lack of flatness they grew up with; casual
You don the tracts, threadbare of sward,
Seamed with water - not the fashion abroad.
If mannerly clothes makyth man, if true
And homely surroundings are a close-fitting hood
That we wear to preserve the self we value -
The town and country planners only could
Give a logical account of the aesthetics of mood.
What they have shaped ranges from the unlivable
To those humane schemes that are lucidity’s friend:
Composition needs discernment to select what is valuable
And the crystal words that through woods did wend
Down Wordsworth’s life were no symmetrical blend.
The reminiscent way of beauty and innocence
Makes glimpses of home, after miles of harshness,
A bath for the eyes, a mystic suspense
Between real and dream, when we feel the caress
Of sanctified vision and the long hours we bless. -
And what calls me to Plynlimon? Not instinct, but analysis!
The Reason, that sifts our minds like wheat
And tosses our values and beliefs into emptiness,
Has not the skill to beautify one street
Or from things of worth to construct the sweet.