by Julia Griffin
“112m-year-old dinosaur tracks damaged in Utah by construction machinery”
—The Guardian
(with apologies to Thomas Hardy)
I
In a solitude of the clay,
Where cattle do not stray,
Nor those great beasts that made them, sadly crumble they.
II
A site once marked by hops
From some triceratops
Now ranks among earth’s palaeontologic flops.
III
One hundred million years
You’d think would leave some smears;
But all was well until last Tuesday, it appears.
IV
The length of time between
The birth of this machine
And that of all those giant lizards – well, I mean
V
It isn’t quite the same;
But still the moment came
When trucks hit tracks, which was a quite titanic shame.