Me, Dinosaur
a prose poem by Christopher Ryan
(For My Mother)
Growing up, I truly had no idea just how much my mother loved me. The only thing I knew back then was that dinosaurs were the most badass thing on the planet and I needed to have them in my life.
I had to have them everywhere in every way. Toys weren’t enough. No, I needed dinosaur bedsheets, dinosaur curtains, a dinosaur light switch, dinosaur cereal, clothes, plushies and videos.
My bedtime stories were the stuff of my dreams; my mother would sit beside my bed every night and read to me from the latest, most awesome dinosaur books.
It didn’t matter that she didn’t know how to pronounce all those difficult Latin names, my four-year-old self was there to help guide her through it.
One year for Halloween she even made a dinosaur costume just to help feed my never-ending hunger for all things large and scaly. I tell you, I was the coolest looking T-rex/Stegosaurus/Godzilla creature to parade around the school yard.
I think it always kind of surprised my mom just how much I was into dinosaurs. One time, she caught me in my little imaginative world where I was the last of the dinosaurs, fighting off extinction, running away from the ever-encroaching sea of lava that was my living room carpet.
There I was, pacing around on top of the sofa, snarling like the caged velociraptor that I was when she happened to walk by. She had that look, that furious “you done messed up, child” look and demanded that I get down.
It always made me sad that my mom inadvertently made the dinosaurs go extinct a second time that day.
My love for dinosaurs never diminished over the years and my mom kept at it too. She was the first one to send me that picture about how “rawr” means “I love you” on my birthday.
I might not have been able to recognize all that she had done for me back then, but now that I can, I only have one thing to say to her . . .
RAWR!!!
PHOTOGRAPH: The author (right) in a dinosaur costume at age five (Halloween 1989).
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Christopher Ryan is a West Coast poet who leans heavily on his experience working in mental health to bring out all facets of human nature in his writing. His works have been featured in several publications and he hosts and performs on the SpeakEasy Café International Poetry Show. “Me, Dinosaur” was the product of a poetry challenge between friends on how to use their childhood love of dinosaurs as a theme.
Silver Birch Press 