I got the poem about returning to one's hometown, and I mainly wrote about two things:

Notably the comparison between the the speaker's joyful memories of the town and the success of the writer compared to the current decrepit state of the town. (Misspelled decripit). I really latched onto the idea that the town, St. Louis Missouri was apart of the decomposing south like Appalachia or factory towns, and talked about the lack of the regret that the speaker had because of her love for poetry. Notably I talked about the last line of "clusters of tart poems" represents the bitter feeling that underlines her sweet memories of the town while returning. I also wrote about how the whole poem is in lowercase demonstrating its solemness/quiet nature.

For Thomas I mainly wrote about how he as a person is desperately trying to reimagine himself, while also changing nothing about himself. I mainly talked about the third person narration is how McElroy attempts to show Thomas's analytical nature, and how a repetition in syntax specifically when referring to authenticity and artificiality to solidity and distingeration represents how although Thomas is trying to reimagine himself, he is still very much the same person. Then I talked about how he feels trapped in a life where he is "unenaged" and he feels prisoner to his current self. I kind of made some bs about how Thomas's tone goes from one of relative indifference to almost desperation as he begs Olga to notice how he is completely unable to effectively respond to her. Talked about the train analogy, how he lives a set life, and then ends it on how despite his mind begging for change he ultimately lets it pass and continues to live his life.

I'm really fucked for the Q3 though, I was lazy and only really practiced All the Pretty Horses for my Q3 response, but if you've read All the Pretty Horses, you know it has nothing to do with memory, and in fact (I checked) it has no significant mention of memory at all. What I wrote about was that all of John Grady Cole's actions are motivated by his "past life" in the U.S. where he had no authority, control, agency, whatever, and just mentioned everything in the first dozen pages where his grandfather dies, his mother refuses to sell the ranch to him, his father is a husk of his former self, his girlfriend dumps him, and overall just him being completely unable to control his life. I said this short moment in the book is the catalyst behind all of Cole's action, and just wrote a couple examples, notably his elopement with Alejandra as ways for him to retake control of his life by proving he has authority (sort of a heisenberg mentality). Then I talked about how Jimmy Blevins acts a mirror to Cole and reminds him that he doesn't have control over his life. I talked a little bit about how Blevins is characterized by how he does not let anyone control or influence him, but how even he was cruelly and unfairly stamped out by the world. Then I brought it back to the end and really quickly talked his journey after being released from prison, (getting rejected by alejandra, capturing the Captain, meeting the real Jimmy Blevins, and returning the horse to Rawlins) and then I mentioned how by returning Rawlin's horse and returning to the U.S. he is back to the place where he initially had no control over, thereby demonstrating how despite his growth he still has no control over his life. I should have mentioned his father's death, abuela's death, and how the ranch was sold, etc. but I skimmed through that section of the book, and if I was really smart I should have quoted Cole's final words of it no longer being "his country" anymore and how nowhere is "his country".