Apples are greater than ashes, but less than or equal to an empty music stand.
Couplets merit full points.
Reminder: Your peers will use this as a checklist, even if they have never yet written an elegy.
Ask: What is the atmosphere? Do birds sing when they shouldn’t?
Make sure the lines are a little prison for feeling, everyone in uniform, on a schedule, ready for lights out.
Never tell your grief, or use the word sorrow, or mourn.
Make sure every punctuation mark gives the impression of being kissed by a stubbled chin.
Be sure to include some form of the following: husk, pearls, something circular, something pried away.
As the honor code states: Any form of flower is grounds for immediate dismissal, as is looking over a dent in the earth and calling it grave.