AP correctly suggests that some years back (2000-2004+/-) the poems we got to read were routinely good, and that is why I go to the Archives now and then to post a poem from those days, just to give everyone a look at what we were getting from Mr. P. When I look at My Documents, I can read the comments I wrote about all those poems, which were exciting and challenging. Most important, they were interesting.Go to the Archive and find a poem called Waiting for Lumber. What do you think of it? I know what I wrote then, and why it occurs to me now to cite it. We have, as it were, lost our playboy of the Western World. It is like finding that a favorite newspaper has been taken over by a crude person, who had the power of endless money, and could buy anything and destroy it. You can't buy me (who? whoever). The poems these days do not encourage me to recommend Slate/Poems to people--as in the past--when I have my Poetry Circle things. Ironically, what I do is based on, and was inspired by, Robert Pinsky's Favorite Poem Project. You could click on it.