BCE

 

Before the Common Era

 

Back when the continents 

looked like dinosaur bones

lying next to swollen oceans.

When fossil fuel walked the earth

In search of now extinct plants,

The aliens arrived in vehicles

Shaped like vape cylinders,

Wandering outside

And looking up

Like heads on sticks

And measured everything

With electric eye stalks

And curved extended claws.

They were scientists

And soldiers back home.

They were restless travelers

Pragmatic gamblers

Hopeful romantics.

They were sometimes sad

Because they understood time.

And their blue-flamed leaving

Ignited a lengthy ice age,

The beginning of next things.

The report they transmitted

If it could be translated

Said they would likely return.

They had more wait in them

Than your average alien life form,

And they would not grow hungry

For a hundred million years.