Excerpt from Ten Great Little Poems Not by the Old Masters, Picked Up Adrift When music ceases to please mankind, thought expressed in verse, poetry, will be a dead cock in the pit. I have thought it necessary to shock the reader at the start, in order to get a level. There are no weights or measures, no rules or guides, by which you can fix the worth of a poem. True lovers of poetry are not necessarily lovers of true poetry - if there is such a thing. They range themselves naturally and honestly into three classes: the aristocrats, who love the poetry that other aristocrats have loved; the dilettanti, who love the poetry that no one else loves; and the illiterati, who love the poetry that amuses or awes them. This booklet is not addressed to any of those classes. It is for nondescripts - persons who form their own judgments regardless of authority. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books.

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