Competition: Pause and effect

In Competition No. 2731 you were invited to supply a poem in praise of punctuation.

An excellent entry, this. Space is tight and I very much regretted not having room for Alan Millard, David Duncan Jones and Frank Osen in addition to the worthy winners below.

The bonus fiver belongs to Basil Ransome-Davies. The rest pocket £25.

I dallied with a comma whose cute curves had made me pause
And catch my breath, if only for a second,
But she’d a wild obsession with an adjectival clause
Whose charismatic syntax always beckoned.

My rebound squeeze, a semi-colon eager to be kissed,
Proved versatile, a mark of many talents.
She had the power to subdivide a rather lengthy list
Or function as the pivot of a balance.

And did I stop there? No! Get this: I nursed a massive ‘pash’ —
An adolescent crush — for punctuation.
I venerated hyphens; worshipped quotes; adored a dash.
It was an out-and-out infatuation.