Its vs. It’s
Poem copyright 2013 by James R. Hoffer, Ringgold, Georgia.
Author of Secrets and Mysteries of the Lost Ark: A Bible Adventure, www.LostArkSeminar.com
Time for a little comic relief again–and on a topic dear to my heart! DLK
Its vs. It’s
By James Hoffer
How it giveth me the fit’s
To see how people spelleth “it’s.”
Doesn’t anybody know
Where apostrophe’s should go?
And it send’s me up a wall
When some self-styled know-it-all
(Leaving egg on his own face)
Put’s apostrophe’s in place’s
Where they have no business being.
Pretty soon we will be seeing
“Their’s” and “your’s” and “hi’s” and “her’s,”
And sundry other kind’s of slur’s.
Yes, it drive’s me to distraction,
This abuse of a contraction
Oft confused with a possessive.
Seem’s like some folk’s are obsessive
To portray themselve’s so literate,
That they end up like an idiot.
For depending on intentions,
Apostrophic interventions,
Here’s the rule to put in action:
“NO possessive, YES contraction.”
To avoid this mass confusion,
I propose a quick solution:
Let’s alleviate frustration,
And get rid of punctuation.
It should make us stop and think
Just how many ton’s of ink
We could save to our good pleasure
If we took this drastic measure.
Thank’s to all the ignorami,
Certainly it’s a shame. I
Wonder when it all will stop.
Guess we need a grammar cop!
(published partially by Roland Hegstad several years ago in one of his religious liberty papers)