Keats in his `Ode to a Grecian Urn` said `Beauty is truth / Truth beauty`

Ever since critics have been trying to fathom out what he meant.

Is there any room at all for beauty in todays poetry?

OR

What is beauty in a literary - or poetic - sense?

OR

How does it differ from beauty in a pictorial sense?

OR

What realation (if any) does it have to truth?

Give instances of poetic beauty.

beauty is in the ear of the beholder
( If you are into ears, that is.)
Beauty, being subjective, is all things to all people and although there is often much overlap, as in a venn diagram,this cannot dictate a right or wrong concept of beauty.
And if beauty is truth, is this the truthful accuracy of the words or the beautiful juxtaposition of the very words being used?
If the latter, I offer a line frequently used by my ex when he went to the pub:- 'I won't be late.'
Not truthful, as he always was late, but on the other hand, not untruthful as he was always early (ie returned in the early hours of the next day)

Beauty also depends where you're coming from.

Greek statues used to be the epitome of beauty in the West.

Then we learnt to appreciate the strange beauty of Japanese prints.

Then someone told us to look at African tribal art and see the beauty there.

Bach is beautiful. So is Beethoven. So is Stravinsky. So is Elvis Presley. And Charlie Parker.

Beauty depends on where you're coming from.

Perhaps Keats is telling us that what we as individuals perceive as beauty is in itself a "truth" for the undoubted reality of its effect on our sensibilities, and therefore the reverse is an unarguable consequence. Whatever - it's one of those lines that poets would kill for - a neat partner for "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder".

If beauty is simply things at their best then it should be something we aspire to maximise in life and poetry. Perhaps though the link between beauty and truth is that things, as in beings in natural form as opposed to man made constructs, are intrisically beautiful? It is something to with appreciation through acceptance, in a vaguely buddhist sense? Therefore as things become less natural they become less truthful and so less beauty-filled. I think this is certainly true when people strive to hard for attain or retain personal beauty. I wrote this a a little on-the-hoof, but when I am not ranting about politics and poetry itself, beauty is a recurring theme in my writing. See my blog for more example including
http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=18130

Always somewhat wary of the non-human=natural=beautiful equation, as if human beings aren't part of the natural world and human creations aren't capable of being beautiful.

I didn't say that Steven, although I did say it is true of human beings attempting to make themselves beautiful or retain beauty that might have passed away if time's natural order had been applied.

I vaguely subscribe to the romantic notion that part of the beauty is transience, the fact that certain things will never appear quite as they are again, whether that is due to the natural processes of entropy, or even if only because the light and angle of perspective will always differ, however slightly.

However, I would state categorically that many (NOTE TO STEVEN - NOT ALL!) man-made things of great beauty tend ape or evoke the beauty of nature.

Additionally I would suggest those that don't fit into that category, often have at their core a simplicity or cleanness of form that makes them feel almost organic.

As a wavering atheist/agnostic I think that if evolution has been an ongoing process of redesign over millions of years based on an economy of energy, it would be arrogant to expect that the concious designs of any brief lived mortal could match up in scale, complexity or attention to detail.

The fact that some seem to is about as close as I get to seeing a miracle.

And Ut Pictura Poesis Is Her Name
BY JOHN ASHBERY
You can’t say it that way any more.
Bothered about beauty you have to
Come out into the open, into a clearing,
And rest. Certainly whatever funny happens to you
Is OK. To demand more than this would be strange
Of you, you who have so many lovers,
People who look up to you and are willing
To do things for you, but you think
It’s not right, that if they really knew you . . .
So much for self-analysis. Now,
About what to put in your poem-painting:
Flowers are always nice, particularly delphinium.
Names of boys you once knew and their sleds,
Skyrockets are good—do they still exist?
There are a lot of other things of the same quality
As those I’ve mentioned. Now one must
Find a few important words, and a lot of low-keyed,
Dull-sounding ones. She approached me
About buying her desk. Suddenly the street was
Bananas and the clangor of Japanese instruments.
Humdrum testaments were scattered around. His head
Locked into mine. We were a seesaw. Something
Ought to be written about how this affects
You when you write poetry:
The extreme austerity of an almost empty mind
Colliding with the lush, Rousseau-like foliage of its desire to communicate
Something between breaths, if only for the sake
Of others and their desire to understand you and desert you
For other centers of communication, so that understanding
May begin, and in doing so be undone.

A bridge like a poem should be a thing of beauty. To make a bridge that is not beautiful is to interfere with a natural order. Witness Tower Bridge: A more monstrous assemblage of stone and metal (in the history of bridges) is hard to imagine. And Elvis used to rub shoe polish in his hair.

My grandson picking strawberries on my allotment last week. "that's a beauty grandpa". Say no more, truth and beauty all rolled into one!

When it comes to people - as it invariably does - I think beauty can be confused with attractiveness - hence the old chestnut 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder'.

Attractiveness has something to do with the chemistry and personality, I think - and once you feel it, it doesn't age, fade or wane - because it was never based on perfection in the first place - unless you start to hate their guts, I suppose :)

In the context of what Harry was asking us to explore, poetic beauty for me lies in words that say something relevant in a lovely way - (sorry to sound like a record that's got stuck) - words that flow, if possible with original imagery ;)

I don't get or buy into the truth bit. Art is about creating something - why should it conform to anything? Maybe I could interpret truth as realism. I like the realism of the war poets. The sadness of it moves me deeply.

A fine example indeed Graham. Simplicity a requirement for beauty, as in bridges. The more we understand stuff- the more simple it becomes and more of its beauty is revealed: The Higgs Boson announcement and the 'strawberry incident' just two fine examples.

And I'd agree with that too Tommy. Sometimes I find that a poet/poem is just trying too hard. A poem may be dripping in imagery but it leaves me cold. There is a lot to be said for sometimes just saying something.

You could be saying the following Isobel: ''Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue.'' and ''Suit the action to the word, the word to the action, ''Hamlet
:o)