Photo by Taylor Franson-ThielThe Second Scientific Revolution
In another life I blow dirt off dinosaur bones
and name my new discovery after my daughter.
Before it can be logged and sent off for future research
I sneak a fossiled claw home to show her.
She takes it devoutly in her hands
still fleshed with baby fat, you’d almost
think she had no bones, and she takes the
tip, traces a line from my collar bone
down to my navel laughing as it snags my shirt.
Her little body warm with delight in my lap.
She doesn’t yet know the words theropod
dangerous or daughter. In this other life,
I am a good mother. I teach her the names
of each dino as she points to them in a picture book.
This one is a velociraptor I say. Normally,
they like to hunt alone. Their mothers stayed
with them only long enough to make sure they could run.
My daughter has just barely learned to walk.
When she is older I will tell her
how I gave something ancient her name.
The next day I return the talon
And it’s like it was never missing,
Like I have never mishandled a specimen,
Like I have never mishandled my daughter.