Reflection on Reciting a Poem In English Class

Annabel Lee

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of ANNABEL LEE;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea;

But we loved with a love that was more than love-

I and my Annabel Lee;

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her highborn kinsman came

And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulchre

In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,

Went envying her and me-

Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,

In this kingdom by the sea)

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,

Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we-

Of many far wiser than we-

And neither the angels in heaven above,

Nor the demons down under the sea,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side

Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,

In the sepulchre there by the sea,

In her tomb by the sounding sea. 

I suppose I was wiser this time and the poem I chose was a bit easier to remember. I also wisely chose a poem that has a story plot that I actually liked a lot. The rhyme of this poem and its repetition of "in this kingdom by the sea" really helped me with the memorizing. I was pretty nervous when I went up since I was still looking over my poem one last time right when Mr. Dahl was taking out the chopsticks. Unfortunately, I wasn't that prepared for my poem, but since I've been memorizing it a long time ago, it wasn't that hard for me to memorize it. I think I did quite reasonably well in the recital, though I could have of course done better if I have had finished that little last minute review. The main problems I had with the recital of this poem were the beginnings of paragraphs, which always introduce a new event of the story. But overall, I didn't make too many mistakes. Another bigger issues with the recital were near the end, since I'm not that familiar with the later part of the poem since there are less repetitions, but still really interesting.

Chinese New Year Reflection

My Chinese New Year wasn't really that traditional at all. The only traditional thing that happened was probably that I had to go to Taichung, but even that isn't really traditional. During Chinese New Years, people are supposed to go back to their mother's parents' house, but I go to my father's parents' house. There are many traditions for Chinese New Year, like cleaning the whole house and playing with fireworks and betting and drinking, but I did none of those. Instead, I went shopping (kind of) and to this "3D-books museum" that was in Taichung. Another thing I did for Chinese New Year was just watching a lot of TV and working out everyday since our swimming coach believed that we're all going to be really out of shape when we get back. The whole time during Chinese New Year, I woke up at 11 and slept at 11. It was pretty nice but lazy, and I'm definitely going to miss it now that it's over. My red envelope money were actually quite a significant amount of money, considering that I only had 7, but I got like more than 10,000. Don't worry though, none of that is mine, because my mom has already "taken care" of it. My Chinese New Year was extremely unproductive and uneventful, but it was a much-needed break from all the school time, and I'm going to miss this break greatly (but the Spring Break is coming soon, and then... the Summer Break!).

Can You Think Out Of The Box?

"Some of the best things in life are those unlike anything ever thought of before. Whether it's a brilliant invention or an entertaining story, a new idea makes life more interesting and worthwhile. Creativity is a poet's bread and butter; a good poet always looks at things in new way. With a small group, plan a design for a new tool. You might want to create a tool to help with a dreaded chore, such as cleaning your room or mowing the yard."

I think creativity is an extremely important trait all people must possess. And, with my shockingly amazing creativity, I can totally think of an amazingly astounding tool that will rock your world and wonder to yourself why isn't it invented or thought of yet! Actually, no, I can't really think of any cool and original new tools to invent. I guess I'd like something to do the dishes for me, but there is already the dish washer. I suppose I'd like a machine that can monitor the calories and create your menus of healthy food and also measure how much you exercise and how much calories you burned. I know there are apps for that, but those are so annoying, so why can't we invent a robot that tracks all your calories and makes your food and can go running (and hopefully even play music for you while you run, because the earphones fall out a lot) with you too! That would be really nice because so many people want to lose weight, and I believe most people would like to lose weight without medications and just lose it through exercise and healthy diets! Weight and image really is extremely important these days after all.