 The English poet Stephen Spender ( 1909 – 1995 ) called " In Praise of Limestone " one of the century 's greatest poems , describing it as " the perfect fusion between Auden 's personality and the power of acute moral observation of a more generalized psychological situation , which is his great gift " . Literary critic David <unk> found it loose and unfulfilling . The poem became " In Praise of Sandstone " at the hand of Australian poet John Tranter ( 1943 – ) , who created a poetic form called the " terminal " in which only the line @-@ ending words of the source poem are kept in the writing of a new work . 
