[@Shienvien] Heh, ofcourse. None taken, I always appreciate the feedback. I'm usually my own worst critic anyway, so I want to know what I screwed up on. What was liked, what wasn't. Etc.

[hider=My reply.]
I honestly outright tried avoiding commenting on others punctuation, because I probably could have debated that for far longer than necessary on everyone's story and I knew without fault, I myself would be bound to make mistakes in this category. Which seems to be what the primary focus of your critique, but I don't mind learning regardless.

Those first two corrections are correct. (The "where" could probably be inferred, but it does specify location that the man is under a yew tree, removing it, could be nitpicked that he could be anywhere that happens to have yew trees in the area.) And I agree that the Ellis sentence could be corrected that way.

I wish you would have shown me your correction, because I wasn't certain what you meant at first. You mean the comma should be placed after 'embellishing bleakness'? Perhaps? But the surface level smile is embellishing bleakness. (the fake smile is covering up a person's inner sadness.) So it is sort of the smile, (or by extension the desire to even fake that happiness when your depressed.) that withers and dies. But I'm open for that change.

Yes, the poetic language is almost entirely the point for this story. It's not sprinkled in for flavor, it's nearly the story itself. It's very much intended to be that way. (for better or worse.) Nearly every part of it is symbolism of some sort and the language is very flowery. I can fully admit the symbolism is fairly service level stuff, perhaps a little unfocused and possible improper flow probably doesn't help. But I wrote this fairly quickly myself. 

(Again, I wish examples and advice/corrections would be provided, when/if possible.) 

In my (hopefully rational/civil sounding) defense. Despite agreeing fully that some sentences was probably too over the top. I do think, a lot of people's flowery language, if not just using big and unused words for the sake of it, for single words that would be more commonly/well used. Another thing I saw in-between various stories was a complex word, just being compared to it's own meaning. I think my flowery language often had a bit more thought in it's usage and often had some point to it.

I have mixed feelings about the sentence structure suggestion. The shrouding clouds were placed first on purpose, comparing it to the muffler expelling it's own shrouding cloud of gas of car exhaust. Putting the other sentence first, guts it of that direct visual comparison. I do agree that the second half of the change might flow better and I'd probably change that bit.

No, I'm English. (I also honestly wouldn't use that as a reasonable excuse if I wasn't.) I've probably just forgot nearly everything I had to self-teach myself in my school. Though you aren't wrong in thinking that part seemed rushed. I actually was going to write that the boy swung at the man with shovel and tussled with him on the ground. But after the man would still treat the boy with forgiveness/kindness. (That or I was considering the boy breaking the actual mentor's grave. But I felt that may come of a little overdone and make the characters actions less forgivable, or believable respectfully.) 

So I did shorten it to keep closer to the word count. Also, I felt putting too much focus on the boy, would undermine the focus of the main character. Sometimes minimal, less is more is just necessary for short (very short) stories.

I think nearly everyone had an ending that seemingly came out of nowhere, to be completely honest. But I had 900 words, opposed to most who far extended themselves in the wordcount. If the prompt was a higher word count, or I had an extra two, three hundred words. I probably could have added a bit more information in that regard. XP

But thank you. Greatly appreciate you taking the time. (I knew the dreaded comma would be my number one enemy. Ha ha.) Glad you mostly enjoyed it. I don't really often indulge myself in the purple prose and symbolism stuff.
[/hider]