Thanks for the responses. Obviously, everybody's got their own preference... one of the reasons I posted this piece was that I remembered a year or two ago when somebody posted a 'lost' Larkin poem. At first, it got a lot of praise, but there were some dissenters in the group and it was interesting to see what they found lacking. Likewise, a poem by RPW that made it into The New Yorker (I think; maybe it was the Atlantic) was criticized for a few weak lines (specifically I remember someone carping about a description of Holsteins as "black and white" being redundant). In any case, what I got out of it is that The Masters aren't exactly impervious to critique, and it can be interesting to see what works and what doesn't in their poetry. I like taking poems that are well-crafted, or appear well-crafted, and picking them apart. So I posted this piece.
The 1993 book was edited by Louise Gluck. I have no idea if Gluck and Hall were buddies, but I would say that the choice was probably motivated by more than its poetical merits. Kenyon's poem, "Battling Depression", is also in this volume. And of course 2 years later Kenyon died.
Overall, I thought this poem was fairly decent, though I agree that if it is scrutinized closely it doesn't exactly stand up. I think that the imagery is a bit raggedy -- but the mood is set very well by the repetition and the images chosen. I'm not sure I would call them "half-images", since I don't know what a "full image" would be. Maybe Hall fails to draw some readers fully into "the nation of rainy days", but for the most part I find it effective. Though not earth-shattering by any stretch. Seems like this poem is one of those that needs to be read in the context of Donald Hall's life in order to be appreciated fully. Funny, because I just posted a blurb about why it's better to ignore the author when critiquing.
As for rhythm, I can only blame my tin ear. I really enjoy poetry by folks who obviously pay a lot of attention to sound & rhythm, such as Roethke (despite some of his excesses), but I couldn't pick out a real pattern with this piece. Glad to see others being able to 'feel it'... it would be interesting to see some Free Verse poems that do some of that dancing that Golias talks about. As for tastes, I'm more of an imagery guy myself.
So anyhow, I'm glad this didn't degenerate into an argument about the merits of Free Verse vs. Metrical or any of that. The BAP series is also really controversial - most anthologies are - and I'm doubly glad we didn't descend into a discussion as to why it sucks, too, because I was a little leery of that.
-eaf
p.s. Non-alcoholic beer IS terrible, but I know one guy that drinks it by the gallon. Don't ask me why.
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