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Famous Rankness Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Rankness poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous rankness poems. These examples illustrate what a famous rankness poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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by Dryden, John
..., and easy of access.
Oh, had he been content to serve the crown,
With virtues only proper to the gown;
Or, had the rankness of the soil been freed
From cockle, that opprest the noble seed:
David, for him his tuneful harp had strung,
And heav'n had wanted one immortal song.
But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand;
And fortune's ice prefers to virtue's land:
Achitophel, grown weary to possess
A lawful fame, and lazy happiness;
Disdain'd the golden fruit to gather f...Read more of this...



by Stevens, Wallace
...266 Decays of sacks, and all the arrant stinks 
267 That helped him round his rude aesthetic out. 
268 He savored rankness like a sensualist. 
269 He marked the marshy ground around the dock, 
270 The crawling railroad spur, the rotten fence, 
271 Curriculum for the marvellous sophomore. 
272 It purified. It made him see how much 
273 Of what he saw he never saw at all. 
274 He gripped more closely the essential prose 
275 As being, in a world so ...Read more of this...

by Dryden, John
...thus, when Charles return'd, our empire stood.
Like Janus he the stubborn soil manur'd,
With rules of husbandry the rankness cur'd:
Tam'd us to manners, when the stage was rude;
And boisterous English wit, with art endu'd.
Our age was cultivated thus at length;
But what we gained in skill we lost in strength.
Our builders were, with want of genius, curst;
The second temple was not like the first:
Till you, the best Vitruvius, come at length;
Our beauties equal; bu...Read more of this...

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