@@ -121,9 +121,11 @@
 * [*page break] ([`\^^]): for formats that support pagination, like EPUB or HTML (when printed), indicates that the rest of the current page should be blank. for formats that do not, extra margins will be inserted. does not create a new section
 * [*page rule] ([`\^-^]): inserts a page break for formats that support them, and a horizontal rule for formats that do not. does not create a new section. comprised of any number of horizontal rule characters surrounded by a pair of carets (e.g. [`^-^] [`^_^] [`^----^] [`^__--^] [`^┈┈┈┈┈^])
 * [*table cells] ([`+ |]): see [>ex.tab table examples].
 * [*equations] ([`=]): block-level equations can be inserted with the [`=] sequence
-* [*cross-references] ([`=>] [`⇒]): inserts a block-level link. uses the same syntax as span links ([`⇒[$ident] [$styled-text]]). can be followed by a caption to add a longer descriptive text. especially useful for gemtext output. ident can be omitted to cross-reference, for example, a physical book.
+* [*cross-references] ([`=>] [`⇒]): inserts a block-level link. has two forms for the sake of gemtext compatibility. [$styled-text] is a descriptive text of the destination. especially useful for menus and gemtext output.
+** the cortav syntax is [`=>[$ident] [$styled-text]], where [$ident] is an identifier; links to the same destination as [` \[>[$ident] [$styled-text]\]] would
+** the compatibility syntax is [`=> [$uri] [$styled-text]] (note the space before [$uri]!). instead of taking an identifier for an object in the document, it directly accepts a URI. note that this is not formally equivalent to gemtext's link syntax, which also allows paths in place of URIs; [`cortav] does not. the gemtext line ["=> /somewhere] would need to be expressed as ["=> file:/somewhere], and ["=> /somewhere?key=val] as ["http:/somewhere?key=val] (or ["gemini:/somewhere?key=val], if the result is to be served over a gemini server).
 * [*empty lines] (that is, lines consisting of nothing but whitespace) constitute a [!break], which terminates multiline objects that do not have a dedicated termination sequence, for example lists and asides.
 
 ##onspans styled text
 most blocks contain a sequence of spans. these spans are produced by interpreting a stream of [*styled-text] following the control sequence. styled-text is a sequence of codepoints potentially interspersed with escapes. an escape is formed by an open square bracket [`\[] followed by a [*span control sequence], and arguments for that sequence like more styled-text. escapes can be nested.