All dinosaurs of the Cretaceous Empire,

How quickly endings come. It is marvelous really, how fleeting the will of time is. How forgotten every moment becomes. When I search the catacombs of my small brain, I remember only some things. I remember my first hunt before I was the Tyrant Lizard King. The pain in the eyes of that Iguanadon as he accepted his end --- and as I caused it. I ran to our star mother, my Mom, with pain leaking from my heart.

“How had I hurt such a magnificent creature? And why was I born to kill, and he born to die?”

She looked at me, piercing with her gaze and said, “Little Lizard Prince, No one was born to die. We all were born to live, and death is what makes the little life we have worth more than half a glimmer.

Though no dinosaur chooses its own death, every dinosaur chooses how it will live”

I remembered her words while I prepared to rule, and when I received the crown.  I gave my life to the Cretaceous empire. And I felt justified in eating a subject here or there. My mother was proud of me.

How quickly endings come. And so they came to my mother.

We all remember the day the star mother passed, but none do like I. She could not speak in her last breaths, so she grabbed a stick of charcoal and wrote for two days to tell me one thing “my life will live on in you and all of the creatures on this earth. Because I acted for the world. Keep giving, my Tyrant Lizard… King”

I broke. I knew her words were true. I knew that life came before death. And I still hated that I killed for myself. For every bite of meat is another dinosaurs gramma, grampa, mother, sister, or loved one.

So, I, the Tyrant Lizard King, ate tofu.

And, To preserve life, I have ever since. Many carnivores followed my lead and our empire thrived.

Herbivores could live without fear.

But how quickly endings come.

For now we are all afraid. The sky is red with fire and our world will be destroyed. Every one of us will die. Our legacy will be forgotten. But in our last breaths, we will not forget each other. Like a monster’s jaw, this meteor closes down upon earth, and we are scared. But this is only one moment in our lives.

We will remember the things that made us joyful. The call of the pseudopods and the jokes of the troodon. The brawls of the ankylosauruses and  the fantastic height of the gigantosaurus. We are all different.  We are Herbivores, carnivores, omnivores - but -- together we are cretaceous dinosaurs who have laughed loved and learned together

How quickly endings come. And how fondly we remember what death cannot take… love