I'm with David in having reservations about generalizing. When I like a poem it often feels to me as if my explanation for liking it is pretty much post hoc, principles I've cobbled together to give my taste some more or less tangible basis. Same with poems I don't like, except that then I feel much less need to explain my reaction.
There ARE principles, but they emerge from practice over time. The practice isn't a matter of trying to fill out some Platonic template or ideal. But at some level we begin to generalize from our reactions because that's one of the things human brain do: lungs exchange carbon dioxide for oxygen, kidneys filter the blood, brains generalize (and discriminate, too!). So there is satisfaction in criticism that seeks to generalize, and it can be intense satisfaction, although always a distant second to that of writing or reading a good poem.
Although I'm a pretty committed writer of formal verse, I wonder if formal versus free might be a useless way to divide poetry. You know, it took us thousands of years to figure out that skin color is a crappy basis for generalizing about human beings; maybe it won't take that long to come to a similar understanding about poetry, something vastly less important.
RPW
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