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Comment by urbankris | Hacker News Reader

I still writes very banal poetry though. I gave it the first 3 lines of a T.S.Eliot poem and it spits out very cliched, trivial poetry.

  Let us go then, you and I,
  When the evening is spread out against the sky
  Like a patient etherized upon a table;
  Let us go, through half-forgotten doorways,
  To places we have never been before.
  Let us explore the unknown, and find our way
  To a place of peace and joy, and never stray.
  Let us find a place of solace, and stay
  Where we can be ourselves, and never fear.
  Let us find a place of comfort, and share
  The love that we have found, and never part.
  Let us find a place of beauty, and bask
  In the warmth of the sun, and never ask.
  Let us find a place of harmony, and sing
  The songs of our hearts, and never tire.
  Let us find a place of contentment, and be
  Forever happy, and never leave.

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I've never been able to distinguish bad from good poetry. Over the years I've asked many people (including teachers) to explain it to me and they cannot. Can you? I would really enjoy understanding.

To address your criticism: To be relatable poetry must be cliched, as it is about the human experience. That is as cliche as it gets: it is about things everyone knows.

I don't think I can, unfortunately :) It's really a subjective evaluation, but I viscerally find GPT3's output here miles less interesting than Eliot. It needs to have some layers... or at least the appearance of having layers. Unexpected combinations of expressions and words.. yet unexpected in a way that they don't seem forced. It shouldn't be just rearranged prose. And it has to have a certain flow... when there isn't flow it has to be deliberate.

You can still like whatever poetry you like, I'm just telling you personal reaction. And even though I use some pretty loaded words like "trivial/banal", it's just how I'd describe my reaction. Not meant to be authoritative.

These lines by GPT3:

  Let us go, through half-forgotten doorways,
  To places we have never been before.
  Let us explore the unknown, and find our way
  To a place of peace and joy, and never stray.
  Let us find a place of solace, and stay
  Where we can be ourselves, and never fear.

The first line has potential. The second one feels slightly worse, but it could still be fine depending on what comes next. Even the 3rd is still ok.. "explore the unknown" is a bit in a the danger zone, but it could easily be continued with something that completely justifies it.

Now this:

  and find our way
  To a place of peace and joy, and never stray.

I don't know, that just feels like a disappointing continuation. There's nothing unexpected about it, and it's an unoriginal sentiment said in a unoriginal way. It can be one or the other, but being both kills it for me. "peace and joy, and never stray" sounds like a forced rhyme and is a bit too saccharine without justification. And there just isn't much there.

  Let us find a place of solace, and stay
  Where we can be ourselves, and never fear.

The first line here is just reiterating, more or less, the previous line. Still boring. Nothing that would jolt you to attention. "Where we can be ourselves, and never fear" is more of the same, just even more unoriginal. "Be yourself" needs to have a lot more around it and be more cleverly woven into context to make it a good poem, IMO.

The rest of the poem just goes on in the same vein. Culminating in:

  Let us find a place of contentment, and be
  Forever happy, and never leave.

"Lets go somewhere nice and be ourselves and happy" said with a lot of generic ways.

As to your point:

  To address your criticism: To be relatable poetry must be cliched, as it is about the human 
  experience. That is as cliche as it gets: it is about things everyone knows.

A poem can be about relatable things, I just thing it has to be crafted with more care than the GPT3 poem I posted appears to be. Again, this is mostly me rationalising my reaction... that is to say, I'm trying to put into words what is mostly an intuitive reaction.

This is the original poem:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/...

Tell me how you think it compares.

Thank you for the detailed response! Given all of the context you give I can see why you could arrive at a conclusion that it is bad. You and the other post seem to agree it is (summarised by me, correct me if I misunderstood) about subverting expectation while still remaining relatable. It's cool in concept, but I think it just does not land for me.

The poem you linked seems very novel. I did not expect most of the wording, but it also did not make me feel anything. This is not a criticism, it is like that for all poetry I've ever read.

I suppose poetry is like all other media. I do enjoy books, shows and music. There the evaluation is much the same. It's about being novel and arriving at a point that is surprising, while not being contrived (e.g. if you could not possibly have figured out what happened given the priors). That does help me frame it. Thanks again :)

I'm glad my response was helpful in some way! And yeah, if it just doesn't land for you that's fine. :) To be honest, poetry kind of grew on me over time.

In a way I find poetry much more similar to music than to literature in the effect it has and how I perceive it.

Just wanted to add this reading of that poem. I find it brings it to life more. Not saying it's going to make you like it, but I think it can be more effective than just reading it. (Some would very much disagree with that though... including Eliot I think :D )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adNOs1izBls

Good poetry "hits different". Basically, it innovates and presents new similes, allegories and expressions that have peak emotional impact, meaning, the words are carefully chosen to create the highest amount of emotional resonance. Also, clichés cannot be present. It has to surprise the reader. If I say: "sky blue". That's bad poetry, because it's boring and predictable. If I say "skype blue" it is more memorable, since nobody before has ever used that before and it stands out. There is also the question of cadence. Basically, you will recognize good poetry when you see it due to how it resonates with your neural pathways related to speech and language centers.

The bit about original wording I can follow, thank you. The bit about it having to resonate is kind of a problem because it just does not :) Even if I know people find it great it just doesn't inspire anything in me. Perhaps I have to make peace with my barbarian nature.

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