One obvious problem with it is that it is not "a truly significant honor." Too many not terrific poets have gotten it, and too few superior poets. And too many who have gotten it, have gotten it for socio-political reasons rather than for their poetry.
On the other hand, one might argue that it isn't the position that's at fault, but the way those chosen to fill it are chosen. If I were in charge, I'd get some computer experts together with poetics experts (subjectively chosen by me, but with as much input from those interested as I could get) and try to devise a program that would analyze and rate poetry, then use it to reduce the number of candidates to a handful that prior laureates or some such group could pick the laureate from.
I know, I know, poetry can't be analyzed, blah, blah, blah. Certainly the first versions of the program I imagine would be crude, but I am absolutely sure an effective one could eventually be created. It would compare what a poet's work with a huge memory vault of poetry in English to determine what it does that is different, for instance, something that can be objectively determined and is important, even though deciding the value of the new may not be--entirely.
Just trying to make such a program could be extremely educational, too, I should think. But don't worry, I'll never be put in charge of any such undertaking, nor will the poet laureateship be dropped, or some poet doing something interestingly unlike what all the established poets of the time are be given it.
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