People plug-in all sorts into python, why not `from microphp import tpl`, `tpl("blah.phtml")` etc.
<html..>
<? foreach($xs as $y): ?>
<? $y; ?>
<? endforeach; ?>
</html>But dedicated template languages have superior ergonomics these days, so why bother adapting PHP to it?
I've just used my own RYO CMS for 15+ years for website work... it's gone through lots of updates, but it's super simple. I'd never make it public as a framework because any decent dev should be able to roll their own anyway, and I don't need the aggravation. But it's basically a VERY simplified cross between {{handlebars}} and React, without attempting to bind the whole DOM to data, plus a DSL for specifying all the pages and modules of each website in SQL, and setting up english-language router rules.
I'd ditch ergonomics any day for understanding what's going on and being able to pare it down as much as possible. Simple website clients pay so little these days it's basically charity work... you need something you can both do in an hour AND never have to worry about WordPress updating.