Apostrophe Free

This drifting stemmed from the news in 2019 that The Apostrophe Protection Society was closing down (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe_Protection_Society). The society did restart in 2022 and is still going, but in the gap between there was a chance for the humble apostrophe to remind use of all the things it can be other than the bug-bear of grammar pedants.

The apostrophe society is no more, no catastrophe

Now the apostrophe is free to be all it is and all it always wanted to be.

Singularly it is so possessive, owns all that it sees - unless it belongs to you or me.

With a friend it can say things, on that ‘you can quote me’

And with more friends it has even more to say, “quote me again”

Sometimes it marks the minutes and seconds

And sometimes it stands for the things unsaid don’t you know, ain’t that so

Sometimes it’s singular but means the plural, as in your p’s and q’s.

Sometimes it’s not there when it should be, on ‘phone,  on bra’, by time rendered unnecessary

And for O’Leary and O’Rourke, it’s just stands for the English inability to put an accent where an accent should be

So pedants can rant and greengrocer’s can err, but the apostrophe is finally free to be all it wants to be.