brachiosaurs were tall,
so they got hit by meteorites first.
but ichthyosaurs died slowly in water that
isn't warm anymore, because a blanket
of grey hair (there will be mammals soon)
knocked out the sun in a prize-
fighting match. i took a shard
of space rock in my belly that
tunneled into my backbone (the ancient
arthropods died too) but you got frozen, by
that ashen sky, slowly, while
your ocean got colder.
the sand shivered too.

why did - somename - do that? ******* *****.
nearly knocked the mirror off my
honda civic when he wiggled like a missile into
my lane. getting in front of me so important?
somename's father is having heart attack in the
hospital.

i know how it would go, if i were to die of old age.
i think i would start to hear a ticking
like a kitchen timer, with a few hours left - careful
with the roast, it's hot.
i think i know how two unseen hands, with
cattle **** fingers,
would gently **** me in the side to keep me awake,
a child at three a.m. on Christmas eve,
waiting for a "clump" from a fat, old man's boots
***** with soot, white beard a cloak of charcoal,
before bolting downstairs at first light
and into my reaper's hands.

we built a teepee in the woods out back,
hoping for a fortress where we could avoid
my parents' calls for us to come inside
and out of the pitch black of a tangled forest.

it wasn’t perfect – there was no hide
with which to cover it, decorated with
red and blue creatures of the earth, dancing
upon geometric patterns.

some of the branches we used to craft this teepee
stuck out, thin, pliable fingers
with budding leaves instead of nails, gently swaying
and conducting some silent melody in the breeze.

these branches were leaned in a circle, supporting each other
with circles of young, green sinew layered beneath their bark.
we bound them together at their peak, unwinding a ball of string
that would fray and disintegrate with every rainstorm.

we failed, also, to consider our chosen place for this Indian home.
rather than soft grass or spongy moss, we sat
uncomfortably and shifting, on layers of dirt
and dead, dry leaves, decaying beneath us
as we stared into a leafy ceiling,
framed and outlined by the gold sunlight,
before the fiery sky turned to purple and red, and
mosquitoes bit at our ankles, driving us from the forest
and into my home.

there we lay, staring up at glow-in-the-dark stickers
mimicking Orion and Ursa, Libra and Gemini,
on my plain and darkened ceiling.