tense/modal is not equivalent to cu gotcha

You expect to be able to use pu in place of cu in front of a selbri to close the front sumti - right? Wrong - if it's an abstraction!

le nu mi klama pu vajni

is a sumti with parse:

({le < [nu (mi {klama < [pu KU] VAU>}) KEI] vajni> KU} VAU)}}

Discussion

• I don't. Sounds like someone mislearned that tenses mark the start of selbri.
• To be fair, the book says:

The placement of a tense construct within a Lojban bridi is easy: right before the selbri. It goes immediately after the cu, and can in fact always replace the cu.

— CLL, (10.1, p. 216)

• Of course, it then goes on to say "(although in very complex sentences the rules for eliding terminators may be changed as a result)."