a sentence
needs
at least one subject
and one verb
(though sometimes the subject
is unnamed it's understood
nevertheless
objects must be named)
...........Johannes Mehserle shot Oscar Grant III.
subject: Johannes Mehserle
verb: shot
object: Oscar Grant III
a sentence becomes sophisticated
when it includes complexity and detail
...........Johannes Mehserle shot Oscar Grant III who was...........restrained faced down
on the ground surrounded by three police officers.
subject: Johannes Mehserle
verb: shot
object: Oscar Grant III
...........A white police officer shot a black man faced down...........on the ground
and will spend less than two years in jail for his...........criminal conviction.
what is the object
of that sentence?
-Kevin Simmonds
Used by permission.
Kevin Simmonds is a San Francisco-based writer, musician and filmmaker originally from New Orleans. His books include the poetry collection Mad for Meat and two edited works: the poetry anthology Collective Brightness: LGBTIQ Poets on Faith, Religion & Spirituality and the late poet Carrie Allen McCray's Ota Benga under My Mother's Roof. He wrote the music for the Emmy Award-winning documentary Hope: Living and Loving with HIV in Jamaica and Voices of Haiti: A Post-Quake Odyssey in Verse, both commissioned by the Pulitzer Center. His genre-defying films, including feti(sh)ameand Singing Whitman, have screened internationally.
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