Herb,
    This analysis makes much sense.  For those not familiar wuitrhg the
term, an existential clause basically expresses the existence of
something. An ungramamtical par>


 A fascinating sentence, both image and structure, and an interesting set
> of analyses.  So let's try another one.  It's an existential sentence in
> which the original verb phrase becomes a participial phrase and replaces
> the subject "there", with a derivation, for those of us who like
> derivations, something like this:
>
> A patch of white hair that opens up into his lips runs from the back of
> his skull down to the front.
>
> Since English tends to avoid indefinites in subject position, this
> sentence is better expressed as the existential
>
> There is a patch of white hair that opens up into his lips, running from
> the back of his skull down to the front.  (I put in a comma simply to
> avoid confusion with running lips (sink ships?).)
>
> This writer then has cleverly moved the participial phrase into subject
> position, maybe because some teacher once said not to start a sentence
> with "there is", giving us
>
> Running from the back of his skull down to the front is a patch of white
> hair that opens up into his lips.
>
> The reasons for considering it an existential sentence are the indefinite
> postposed subject and the copula, further supported by the otherwise
> anomalous participial phrase subject.
>
> The comma, I think, is unrelated to any of this.  Rather, there is a
> tendency among inexperienced writers, and experienced ones as well, to
> insert a comma between a long subject and the verb.
>
> Herb
>
>
> A student wrote the following sentence in an essay:
>
> Running from the back of his skull down to the front, is a patch of white
> hair that opens up into his lips.
> The comma doesn't belong there, but I'm not sure why.  Is the "Running"
> phrase a gerund?  If so, then I understand why the comma is wrong:  it
> separates the subject from the verb  However, the phrase doesn't behave
> like
> a gerund.  Compare:
>
> Running around the lake is a part of my daily routine. --> It is a part of
> my daily routine.  --> A part of my daily routine is running around the
> lake.
>
> In this sentence, the "Running" phrase behaves like a true noun phrase in
> a
> linking verb sentence.  My student's "Running" phrase doesn't behave like
> an
> NP.  It feels participial, modifying "patch".  If so, then the comma would
> be correct.  But it's not.
>
> Any ideas out there?
>
> John
>
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