Belated Love Song for Dinosaurs

In all your lumbering, big-boned

strides like awkward teenagers,

and you also, smaller ones, you tiny

chicken-lizards with heads bobbing.

Sandpaper skin, beaks toward the sky.

A volcano breaks out in prophecy.

Such short arms, useless little hands,

I want to clasp them, to hold you like a lover,

make you understand remorse.

Terrible things happen in those jaws.

Lying down in this stony old nest

I imagine your startled eyes.

An unbroken egg twitches, thin reminder.

Foresight is as scarce as hen's teeth.