Light verse is what fools mistake for shallow verse. It engages us and we don't notice that it's every bit as profound as solemn verse.
I was t/walking on the beach with my nearest and dearest who spent his life in publishing--journalism and non-fiction. He said that if he were still in the business and had enough capital to risk on poetry he wouldn't publish these slim volumes but great big fat volumes with a variety (not too many) of poets in them and there'd be a leavening of what we call "light" poems and most of them would rhyme. He was thinking commercially not critically. He said poets had brought about their own publishing downfall. He said people wanted their money's worth and they wanted something they could pick up again and again and search through and I remembered how he came to my notice many centuries ago because of his (A) record collection but above all because of his (B) collection of humorous poetry anthologies. All of the Penguin poetry publications. I read Louis MacNeice's "Bagpipe Music"
http://www.artofeurope.com/macneice/mac6.htm in one of those.
He didn't and doesn't read poetry except as an occasional divergence. I think there are a lot of literate thoughtful people who would read a lot more poetry if it were as intelligent and entertaining as Louis MacNeice.
But he can also quote more "non-light" poetry than I can. By dividing poetry into proper and silly we have bored the pants off the public. That's why no main stream publisher will risk publishing poetry.
Byron was as political as Christopher Hitchens and as funny as Stephen Fry. And yet he could rival Berlioz in expressive and romantic phrasing.
Was Shakespeare "light" or "serious"?
Let in the light!