Poetry comes with anger, hunger and dismay; it does not often visit groups of citizens sitting down to be literary together, and would appall them if it did.

Morley contrasts poetry’s origins in intense private experience with the polite, organized sociability of “literary” gatherings. The triad “anger, hunger and dismay” suggests that genuine poems are often born from urgency—emotional heat, deprivation, or crisis—rather than from cultivated taste or social performance. His jab at “groups of citizens sitting down to be literary together” implies that institutionalized culture can domesticate art into a safe pastime, mistaking discussion and refinement for creation. The final clause—poetry would “appall them if it did”—underscores how real poetry can be disruptive, morally or emotionally unsettling, and therefore unwelcome in settings that prize decorum and consensus.