An Archaeologist

He thought they were

Tall people

Very tall giants

With little arms

And big teeth

They were dinosaurs

He thought

They were dinosaurs

They named a college

After him

An entire college

Because he was rich

And because he was rich

He was able

To go to all these digs

That he financed

And dig up priceless artifacts
Improperly

And handle them carelessly

And then take guesses

At what they might have been

And he was almost always wrong

Wait, no, that’s not true

He was always wrong

Not almost always

Always

The man held a press conference

Nearly a hundred years ago

And held up a dinosaur bone

And said--

This must be a human

And you could give him

The benefit of the doubt

It being that long ago

But people already knew

By then

That dinosaurs were a thing

This man, he was just--

There are three hospitals

Named after him

Three

Did I tell you that?

I told you about the college but--

Three hospitals

A small airport in Arizona

There’s a statue of him

In his hometown

And he was a colossal idiot

But he was rich

And generous

I won’t say he was stingy

Although he kept

Way more than he gave away

The man held up

A dinosaur skull

And said--

Look how big

Our noses used to be!

A toddler

Would have been

More eloquent

The man was married

Five times

To five incredible women

Who were all smarter than him

And all of them died

Alone and broke

Because he moved on from them

Isn’t that--

Never mind

This man wanted to name

His giant humans

‘Jumbo-Men’

I’m not making that up

That’s true

He thought he discovered--

Except of course

He didn’t discover anything

Everybody else did that

He didn’t like heat

Or dust

Or dirt

So he flew in

After they made their discovery

And the scientists working for him

Told him they had found dinosaur bones

And he said--

No, this is a Jumbo-Man

And called the newspapers

He’s still in textbooks

He’s still taught in archaeology courses

He’s still somehow considered interesting

There’s a photo of him

In a textbook

Holding up the dinosaur skull

Which was irreparably damaged

When he didn’t hire the right people

To pack it up

Underneath the picture

There’s a caption that has his name

And next to it--

Archaeologist

They call him

An archaeologist

So

What do you think of that?