Truly, you've been endowed with a profound gift for writing, and you write with a very intelligent tone; your choice of words, most particularly adjectives, is simply sublime, as is your choice in metaphors and allegories.
Your form and style are indeed superb, but as for the pieces themselves, I would have to consider them a tad drab, and they both sound very much to me like mandatory essays. What I would truly enjoy reading from such an excellent writer as yourself is a narrative, historical or fictional, something that captures emotion in addition to concepts and ideas, a piece that reflects upon yourself rather than what is mandated of you. I'd like to read something that you wanted to write.
By the way, you have an excellent taste in avatars, my friend.