1. something that puts an aesthiant into a significant manywhere-at-once. A good portion of my book, Of Manywhere-at-Once was about this. Ultimately, it goes back to my theory of the brain. I hold that memories are literally stored on various places in the brain, some connected to each other, some not. Pleasure occurs when (significant) memories in two or more separate parts of the brain are suddenly linked--without overmuch dissonance. The aesthiant will then experience the memories all-at-once, or nearly all-at-once, to arrive in Manywhere-at-Once.

The primary way this happens is equaphorical, or via figures of speech (equaphors). In "Sonnet 29" it happens most clearly when the poet writes that his "state" or "essence" (as I now unslant the locution to give it logic) "Like to the lark at break of day arising/ From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate." I suggest that, normally, an aesthiant's brain would, in one locale, have a picture of, and associated emotions about, a lark flying and singing in a morning sky (the complex comprising a "knowlecule," in my theory), and--in a second locale--a second knowlecule concerned with being in a good mood. For the poem to work on him, the two brain locales must not be connected. The poem connects them, and the initial feeling will be confusion, a hint of irritation. But the logic of the combination should briskly heal the consternation, and the new, effective combination will cause pleasure. The pleasure (a pleasure of solution, by the way) will ignite increased energy which will allow the aesthiant better to experience feelings of flight, of being near heaven, of just how much happiness hymnns can express, the shatter of night--and the high exuberance one can feel when being with, or merely thinking of a good friend (who needn't be a sexual partner).

Or so I assert. I feel like I ought now to unwrap my whole neurophysiological theory of pleasure, but I haven't time, so the above will have to do. What I think simplifies to the idea that happiness results from the sudden logical melding of seeming unconjoinables. Or of things one would not expect to be joined.

2. something significantly fresh, the next thing I look for in a poem, is almost as important. Actually, Manywhere-at-Once has to be significantly fresh or it wouldn't be manyhere, it would just be the unfresh melding of previously melded materials. So I should call no. 2, "something otherwise significantly fresh." Fresh words, fresh use of words, fresh typography, fresh visual arrangement of the poem, fresh subject matter, etc. In "sonnet 29" the misuse of "disgrace" is a good example of fresh word use. Shakespeare gets accidental freshness from words well-known in his time but seldom seen or heard in ours, like "bootless." I think his keen competence has some freshness, too. Overall, though, I wouldn't say "Sonnet 29" is unusually fresh--for a superior poem.

3. an archetypal basis, I also consider of high importance. A superior poem must be about more than who happens to get elected president of the US or how good plums taste. Of course, what is finally archetypal is a subjective matter, but I feel confident that a consensus of informed aesthiants will generally be able to distinguish it from what is ephemeral. The Shakespeare sonnet is definitely archetypal, for me, for I consider Friendship one of the most important things in life, though perhaps a tick less so than love, death, beauty, truth and the coming of spring or winter.

4. sufficient coherence; I go with the conservatives who believe a poem should on a first exposure give an aesthiant reason for believing it has some kind of coherence--as narrative, envirative or aesthative (assuming the one exposed has a reasonable understanding of and sensitivity to poetry in general, and the kind of poem the particular given poem is. I don't think a good poem should reveal the bulk of its major meaning quickly (in general), but it should eventually yield to analysis. If no one can say explicitly why a poem is valid after many tries (as in the case of many of Gertrude Stein's texts), I tend to believe the poem must be invalid, however many intuitives rave about it. Needless to say, Shakespeare's sonnet is easy to follow, for anyone with any experience with the literature of his time.

5. reasonable unity; a poem can be coherent but not hang together--in some way. I've always preferred a full-length play to a vaudeville revue. In a revue, you can have many good moments you can enjoy for themselves; in a larger entertainment, you can have the same number of good moments that you can enjoy for themselves--but also for how they interconnect with each other and contribute to the central meaning of the piece--as happens everywhere in "Sonnet 29."

6. musicality; here we have the standard virtues that seem to be nearly the only thing for formalist poets: alliteration, rhyme, consonance, assonance, euphony, meter--the devices I call melodations. They can be powerful, as in Shakespeare's poem, and it's foolish to sneer at them as too many freeversers and burstnormers do--but they are essentially decorative, and far less moving than genuine music.

7. interesting subject matter; this seems to what Philistines most value, except that they might describe it as "proper subject matter." I don't count it irrelevant, quite, but feel that all possible interesting subject matter has already been tried thousands of times by artists. The subject of "Sonnet 29" is cliched. The sonnet is a world-beater, anyway.

8. formal resonance. That Shakespeare's poem is a classiformular sonnet gives it resonance with all the such poems in ours and other languages, which gives it a good deal of aesthetic weight. It includes an ambience of Intensity, Romance, Deep Feelings, Lyricism, Formality & Ultimate Seriousness (however light some sonnets may be in part), and much else that has come to be associated with sonnets. This has to add value to a poem (although its absence might contribute to the more important value of freshness)

9. meaningful allusiveness. By this I mean explicit allusions to other works or mythology or science, etc. I find no such allusions in "Sonnet 29" but am not expert in Shakespeare's time or the literature of that time, so may be missing obvious allusions I hope others will apprise me of. Skilled use of allusions can steal others' beauty or truth for one's own poem; if one's poem can bear its comparison to the allusions, it can only be helped by them.

10. historical, biographical or sentimental values. These are the minorest value a poem can have, but they are there in some poems. Even in this one, the fact that it has Shakespeare's name on it raises its ability to give enjoyment, however ersatz. If we know to whom it was addressed, we'd gain more of this.

Okay, you've just gotten what I consider rough notes toward a rough first draft on what to look for in recognizing a Major Poem. I hope it helps, nonetheless. Below is Shakespeare's poem again, for reference:

Sonnet 29

When, in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
I haply think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
  For thy sweet love rememb'red such wealth brings,
  That then I scorn to change my state for kings.