fix: EXPLAINME.adoc — quote README claims, brief format, evidence table

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

Author: hyperpolymath

EXPLAINME.adoc

@@ -1,27 +1,44 @@
-= Standards — EXPLAINME
-:toc: preamble
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: PMPL-1.0-or-later
 
-This document backs up the claims made in README with evidence and rationale.
+= Hyperpolymath Standards — EXPLAINME
 
-== What Is This?
+== "Canonical source for policies, templates, and specifications"
 
-Standards is a hyperpolymath project. See README.adoc for usage.
+[quote, README.adoc]
+____
+Organization-wide standards, specifications, and governance templates for the Hyperpolymath ecosystem.
+____
 
-== Why These Choices?
+This monorepo consolidates the A2ML specification family, governance templates, protocol definitions, and enforcement tooling that all Hyperpolymath projects must follow.
+Former satellite repos (meta-a2ml, playbook-a2ml, agentic-a2ml, etc.) were absorbed into subdirectories as of 2026-02-08.
+See link:README.adoc[] for the full directory map and specification list.
 
-=== Language
+**Caveat:** Standards are prescriptive -- not every downstream repo is fully compliant yet. Enforcement is via CI workflows and Hypatia scanning, not manual audit.
 
-The language(s) used in this project were chosen per the hyperpolymath
-language policy (see CLAUDE.md for the full list of allowed/banned languages).
+=== Evidence
 
-=== Architecture
+[cols="2,3", options="header"]
+|===
+| Path | Proves
 
-Architecture decisions are documented in `.machine_readable/` checkpoint files.
+| `a2ml/`
+| A2ML format specification -- the machine-readable metadata format used across all repos
 
-== Alternatives Considered
+| `meta-a2ml/`
+| META.a2ml, STATE.a2ml, ECOSYSTEM.a2ml specs and IANA registration drafts
 
-(To be filled in as the project matures.)
+| `agentic-a2ml/`
+| AGENTIC.a2ml spec -- AI agent interaction patterns
 
-== Proof of Claims
+| `contractiles/`
+| Contractile system (must/trust/dust/intend/k9) -- policy enforcement primitives
 
-(Link formal verification results from the `proven` repo where applicable.)
+| `axel-protocol/`
+| Axel protocol specification -- cross-forge automation standard
+
+| `groove-protocol/`
+| Groove universal plug-and-play protocol -- inter-service communication
+
+| `hooks/`
+| Pre-commit and CI hooks -- the enforcement layer that makes standards stick
+|===