Firstly, I did not realize that literature was not taught how it is today until very recently, the 19th century, and that previously English studies focused more on the use of the language rather than the meaning. Honestly I do not believe this distinction is as drastic as the article claims, considering this class as well as some of my previous ones have focused on the actual structure of the language, but I do agree with the point that English departments these days aren't really teaching English as much as they are teaching a little bit about other subjects. Anybody can sit down and read a book and find meaning, but the study of English is originally meant to learn how to craft the language and experiment with styles in order to achieve the best intended effect, something of which I do wish we did more. Literature is certainly something good to study, but looking at the Clemson English curriculum it does focus heavily on this and leave very little for the study of rhetoric. I also think it's important to keep the discipline of English from becoming a purely intellectual subject matter, which is sort of what this author is implying has happened. The study of the language itself is similar to science in its essence and I don't want to lose sight of that aspect.

I wonder if this attitude of his father will resurface as the story continues and if his father will give up early and let Joe continue the work just as he does here.

The first character introduced other than the narrator is his father. This signifies the importance of Joe's relationship with his father throughout the remainder of the story and provides context as to why Joe is the way that he is.

With perspective after reading through page 83, this is a very important verb choice for the opening sentence and probably subconsciously sets the tone for the material this novel will be dealing with. Joe's mother is "attacked" not too far into the story and looking back it feels silly and careless to refer to trees as attacking when so much worse can actually happen.

the repeal or abolition of a right, law, or agreement

Safe is certainly not the word I would have chosen for this description and the author recognizes this through the italics. It has connotations of timid, shy, and opposite of a traditional lawyer. Perhaps this is to set up a contrast for Bartleby or perhaps it is for another purpose.

The first paragraph is written acknowledging that a literal story and piece of literature is being written. Most stories and novels do not begin in this way and rather begin already involved in the story.

The capitalization in this aspect of the title is not traditional, capitalizing "Of" but leaving "street" lowercase. I don't really know the effect but it is noticeable.

I think it is telling that the story is titled "Sticks" rather than "Crucifix" or "Poles" because this is how it is described within the story. A stick is something that used to be alive, part of a living tree, but now it is dead and just sits on the ground. It feels to me that the father is repeatedly trying to instill life back into the sticks but it has to be changed and replaced often because it is only temporary happiness, there is nothing he can put on the stick to make it fully come back to life. As the story proceeds and the costumes for the pole become weirder, the father reveals his growing desperation to be happy. I would also like to note how the father was strict and mean to his kids and the pole was is sole source of joy. Ultimately he was looking for joy in the wrong places because the children are still alive while the sticks are dead. I don't know if this interpretation was intended but it is obviously a sad and tragic story.

I wonder if the writers intended bear to imply use as well. Because if not, nothing is in here to imply the right to use arms, which is interesting because they are pointless if not being used.

These specific words certainly pose a threat to those who favor guns without any sort of regulation. In fact, the amendment says that arms should be well-regulated, so this actually works in favor of those who suggest greater gun control.

Here Paul writes Love as acting like a person, implying that love is not something that we should just have but something that we should actually be.

This metaphor emphasizes the great need for love as opposed to simply putting on a show. A sounding brass and clanging cymbal make lots of noise and everyone notices them, but they do not have the melody and beauty of actual music.

This line would not make as much sense today as the word "love" because now most people associate charity with the literal actions of giving rather than the love which is supposed to drive them. The modern connotation of charity here makes for a contradiction.

Proper grammer today would write "angels and me" so it is interesting to see how little rules such as this have changed throughout time.

This song includes a lot of rhyming, which makes sense for rap but it also does well to keep the audience engaged. Many choices were made within this song because it is meant to be performed live.

Here there is a modern reference to being on the bench at a sports game which certainly would not have been said during the 1700s but it effortlessly bridges the gap between the historical content and the modern presentation.

This is a great play on words that doesn't really need much of an explanation on my part. I think this type of language is very important within theatre, it is something that Shakespeare does quite often, especially because it makes a greater impact when spoken rather than read.

So far the garden has been an image of goodness to come but now she reveals that it is haunted. I am very curious what the ghosts are that prevent this garden from being beautiful but I also enjoy the ambiguity because I can really relate to it in my own way.

This song plays with time in an interesting way because it takes place in the future as in "someday" and then jumps back into the past while discussing the same place. The singer has grown up within her desired future because she has been living within her dreams.

This line is both hopeful and full of defeat. It seems as though the entire song has been leading up to this point and that this is "what she wanted" mentioned earlier in the song. It is hopeful also because it seems she really believes that her life can become like her dream. However, the singer wakes up too soon and is therefore disappointed. I think this really represents how close she is to getting better and moving on from whatever trauma has happened but she is not quite there yet.

Morning, midnight, and noon continue the three-part structure of the poem, although they are not laid out in the order that one would expect. Yeats understands that time would not really be important or demanding if he lived on Innisfree.

The dash within bean-rows balances the dash in honey-bee at the end of the line. The entire poem conveys this sense of balance in several ways, like the abab rhyme scheme and the first and third stanzas beginning with the same words.

This is the first sign within the poem that the speaker is not actually planning on literally going to Innisfree. He waits until the very end of the poem so as to make the images as realistic as possible. If we as the reader believe he is talking about a real place then certainly the speaker can convince himself he is there as well.

This is the first time in the poem where the artist is actively involved. In all the preceding lines, either the speaker or the girl was active. This gives a sense of passiveness to the artist and reveals how this woman is still the one in control of his life and happiness.

"We" is a unique pronoun choice here because it implies that the speaker is not alone in his/her visit to the art studio. The poem is not just a dialogue between the speaker and the reader but also between those who were present with the speaker. The presence of plural first person contrasts the oneness of the muse in a more extreme fashion.

The verb changes tense from present to past within the same sentence. From this subtle change, the reader is informed that the woman in the paintings used to be beautiful and full of life but something bad happened and so she is different in the present.

This imagery carries on the simile of the moon and nighttime from before. The speaker says she is as fair as the moon perhaps because the moon is very pretty but more likely because the moon is only visible at night, just like the girl.

The lady of the paintings was described as the moon in the previous line. "Wan"is a play on the word "wane" which is part of the moon's cycle.

Here is the turning point of the poem because before this line, the reader was present in a carefree world with no war. Yet both sections exist in the present tense, implying that they are either happening at the same time in different locations or that the speaker simply does not want to admit that the past is no longer the present.

You can really feel the present tense of "today" through the many "ing" verbs throughout the poem: watching, smoking, wresting, teasing, etc. They make the reader part of the action in an intimate way.

There is already a lot of smoking imagery within this poem. I saw it first with them mention of Jimi Hendrix who was at Woodstock where there was obviously an abundance of drugs. Secondly the people are described as "green" and "weeds". Two lines down Hayes mentions grass which is another way of saying marijuana.

This is clever word use because "numbed" is fitting for two different reasons. Firstly, numb correlates to the cold weather, and the body becoming literally numb within the dark of December. Secondly, it is used similarly to the phrase "numb to emotions". The girl and boy here are numb in both senses.

The final stanza begins with a different line and overall style, signaling that this stanza contains information contradictory to the first two. This stanza firstly concerns humans now instead of the inanimate objects of a tree and a brook. The main difference is that this "gentle girl and boy" can "feel it" while the other two are oblivious to their pains.

The word "too" really stuck out to me in this line. Keats is writing as though the tree should not be happy because it is in dreadful weather and cold. It is definitely a tone of longing, because the speaker is unable to remain happy like the tree.

Cleaving is a purposeful and important word choice for this poem because it does not fit with the rest of the metaphor of seams and cloth and yarn balls. I would expect a word more like "tearing" to fit this vocabulary. Cleaving is also capitalized so we cannot claim it is a random choice. I interpret this to imply an impossibility of repairing the the cleavage. If it were only a tear then the seams and stitches would solve the problem; however, "cleaving" is not so easily fixed, emphasizing the magnitude of the problem.

I find it odd that Wordsworth would describe this girl as "rolled round" right after claiming that she has no motion. I know it is a different kind of motion because it is through the earth and not her body, but it is relevant that even after one dies it may seem there is no motion, in reality she will never fully be dead or gone.

I don't think the word "earthly" is a coincidence here because it ties in perfectly to the earthy/nature theme of the last line of stanza two. It feels as though Wordsworth did not recognize this girl as fully human while she was alive and only after she died was he able to recognize her mortality.

It really makes me happy that this is the name of a famous poet because his words are worth so much to the world of poetry and literature. It makes me wonder if he thought about this pun too when he was writing his pieces.

The word "these" is not a random choice here. Pound is differentiating some faces which are the "petals" from the rest of the faces which are most likely gloomy and average. It certainly calls into question who these faces belong to and what makes them special enough to be petals in an otherwise dreary setting.

A bough is not just a branch on a tree, it is actually one of the main branches of the tree which supports the structure. This is important because Pound is implying that the metro station is not just part of the city/society, but rather it is an essential aspect which holds the people together.

This is an unusual verb choice because infants do not have the ability to make conscious decisions, or so we think, but Blake is speaking as though he was and still is aware of the experience.

This is the only appearance of an exclamation mark in the whole poem which brings extra emphasis to the mother's pain. Blake clearly has a negative outlook towards his own birth, not just from his perspective but also his mother's.