In this volume, the author has included 130 poems that have both appeared in nine manuscripts he has written and in 40 magazines that have accepted his work. In this way, Kemp Gregory has attempted to give a representative sampling of his life-long commitment to the "sullen craft and art" he has been committed to since his junior year in college (1968). However, each piece has been chosen not simply to be "representative." Such an attempt is ultimately sterile. The author likes the poems chosen, and he has considered the responses of many readers who have enjoyed particular poems in this collection. The author hopes that The Quintessential kg will find some new readers who love poetry and the intense, nuanced appreciation of existence, in both its positive and negative aspects, that poetry, above all, seems to give the reader who is unafraid to face the complexities of truth.