He was named by Governor Richard Wilson Riley as the third South Carolina Poet Laureate from 1984 to 1985.

[2] In high school, he participated in track and lettered in football, focusing more on athletics than academics.

He then began a long career at the University of South Carolina in 1954, eventually becoming a full professor in 1963.

[1] Rees was named to be South Carolina's third poet laureate by Governor Dick Riley in 1984.

[6] In addition to his published books, some of Ennis' work has appeared in Journal of English, The Southern Review, The New Republic, and Germanic Philology.