The dinosaur at the end of her bed was green; her socks, magenta.
She leaned over and clutched it,
her hands gripping onto its skin, fuzz rather than scales,
and making it dance—
all big legs and tiny arms aflutter,
jaws open in a contented gape.
She clutches Rufusaurus Rex when
she needs to feel closer to the center of the earth,
from the crust, to the mantle, to its inner core
feeling for
some semblance of depth,
the way her socks dig into rivers of carpet,
the way her toes curl into rivulets of synthetic fibers,
the way her crescent moons atop her nails dig into dinosauric fluff
all claws and roar and stuffed
from tail to teeth.
Prehistoric comforts
that hide beneath mountains of pillows and clothes
she meant to put away,
but Closet Mountain still stands,
a pile of t-shirts at its peak.
Instead, she builds blanket forts extending from bed to floor,
crawls flashlight in hand through an entrance of fitted sheet
and drags Rufusaurus Rex behind her,
past hills of homework,
deserts of girly and grown-up expectations:
a girl and her dinosaur
little arm in little arm,
her socks, magenta.
And together, they roar into the dark.