diff --git a/extra/ctags/ctags.factor b/extra/ctags/ctags.factor
index 2ec1208df9..e8c5608375 100644
--- a/extra/ctags/ctags.factor
+++ b/extra/ctags/ctags.factor
@@ -9,13 +9,22 @@ io.encodings.ascii math.parser vocabs definitions
 namespaces words sorting ;
 IN: ctags
 
+: ctag-word ( ctag -- word )
+  first ;
+
+: ctag-path ( ctag -- path )
+  second first ;
+
+: ctag-lineno ( ctag -- n )
+  second second ;
+
 : ctag ( seq -- str )
   [
-    dup first ?word-name %
+    dup ctag-word ?word-name %
     "\t" %
-    second dup first normalize-path %
+    dup ctag-path normalize-path %
     "\t" %
-    second number>string %
+    ctag-lineno number>string %
   ] "" make ;
 
 : ctag-strings ( seq1 -- seq2 )