How do you conclude that you've written a satisfactory poem?

A poem is satisfactory when I know I will feel comfortable to perform it without being embarrassed by its failings. (All poems have failings, I am content when I can produce a poem with fewer failings than - say - anything by the current Poet Laureate).

I don't consider a poem 'good' until someone approaches me after a reading with a valid question about some aspect of it; that is when I know it has made someone think.

I can tell as I am writing it. And if I am able to finish a piece of work.

Sometimes I think I might have something,

and then about three quarters of the way through it,

I toss it away.

Ultimately I hope it goes back into my subconscious, and that

I can use some of it later.

But I won't beat a dead horse.

Nor will I submit a poem that is sub-par.

I think most of us can be honest with ourselves enough to do that.

I lack Synopsis' courage, and have never read to an audience, but I agree with his answer. For my own part, I achieve satisfaction when I "sort" it. I keep my poems on a computer. I leave them "unsorted" for a month or two, then I revisit them and put them in a folder according to my opinion of them. I get satisfaction from putting one in the folder of best pieces.

I don't recall my words. For me it happens when I have written the last word and I feel a crying or a happiness. Most often a crying.

I need Not, other's opinions. It's 'satisfactory' to me, when I've let it/some out.

Charles Bukowski said 17 days.The time difference between writing it and reviewing..how he came by that figure (?)maybe it is just an approx...