Dot this!

Oh my the puncture to my persuasion
when some contest judge with more anal eyes
than creativity's elation
fusses over a comma or semi colon,
spewing a literary surgeon's drool
upon my poetic inspiration.

As if the world of quills
will be destroyed forever in a maelstrom of grammar violations,
if one fails to pen with their exacting precision
all the jots and tittles
their minds can bear to be without.

When was the muse slain
that flowed beauty in thought
where it captures the breath of something divine
without the dread of a missing period
killing the flower of a stanza's blooms?

So let's have a — of thanks
unto the comma police,
let them brand our souls with question marks,
tattoo a semi comma on our derrières,
emblazon a period between our eyes,
brand an exclamation point upon our chest.

As long as they promise
to put quotation marks on their tongues
and bear a little sunshine in their criticisms,
find that heart they dipped in sauerkraut apostrophes,
while trying to remember that using all those little marks
won't guarantee you a seat in heaven,
so don't condemn others to hell
for the accidental misuse of the punctuation spell.