Dinosaur Cantata

BY LEONARD H. BERMAN
Full chorus
Here in this soft and shaded glen,
'Neath a canopy of leaves that shield us from the eyes of men,
We wait.
Here, where the light is filtered green,
And the opalescent moon cast silver sheen,
We wait and dream.
A thousand years is but a blinking of an eye,
We float in time.
Staccato blurts of light, like fireflies in flight,
We fade, then shine.
The magic keeps us safe.
The magic keeps us safe.
Everything that ever was remains,
The dream time comes again and it ordains,
Us travel down the endless thoroughfare,
To tell our tale so none are unaware,
And then again, dissolve into the air.
Here in this soft and shaded glen,
'Neath a canopy of leaves that shield us from the eyes of men,
We wait.
Here, where the light is filtered green,
And the opalescent moon cast silver sheen,
We wait, we breathe, we dream.
Trio of female voices
Such wondrous beauty, suddenly destroyed,
We wonder, we wonder.
Millennia of strivings suddenly made void,
We wonder, we wonder.
Why did the master choose another plan?
Destroy our kin and raise up ingrate man?
Why was creation rent and torn in half?
Why are we left a living epitaph?
We wonder, we wonder.
Solo female voice

And yet we live for reasons still unknown.

Destruction came and we were left alone.
Bereft of hope, with sudden fall from grace,
We happened on this wondrous secret place.
With leaves so tightly intertwined and great,
No death like cold or ash could penetrate.
With light and warmth arising from the earth,
A sacred fire taught us of our worth.
A thousand years have passed, again we're born,
We live and wonder why we live to mourn.
We wonder, we wonder.

Male voices
Make way, make way,
The old ones slowly come.
Attend, attend,
Their time is premium.
With deferential heads bowed low,
We honor ancient kin for what they know.
Old one
Gather round me now and hear the story I must tell,
Put aside your games, your frolics and your toys.
Attend to me, my little ones, my dearest girls and boys.
Scales upon my hide have turned from brilliant green to white.
Teeth, once razor sharp, are dull and cannot bite.
Our time is short, my memory frail,
Now hear my wondrous tale.
Young ones
Begin with once upon a time.
Relate in meter, feet and rhyme.
In prose our history relate,
And make us tremble at our fate.
Regale us till you have applause,
With wondrous stories of past dinosaurs!
Old one

Yes, wondrous dinosaurs!

For that is what we are.
Thunder lizards great, both massive and bizarre.
True rulers of the earth sublime,
Since the dawn of time.
Young ones
Tell us, tell us,
What befell us.
Cut to facts.
Be abrupt!
Old one
Children, children, do not interrupt!
With thought I gather from the vast abyss,
Torrential rains and fogs of genesis,
Just touch my claw and sail with me,
Upon the primal sea.
See now comes the darkening hurricane,
With ancient brethren who will breathe again,
Let them breathe the air o're which they reigned,
And bring with them earth's paradise, regained.
The sky was streaked with green that fateful day,
The pterodactyl soared and swooped for prey,
The brontosaurus labored on the land,
While ichthyosaurus from the seas command,
Iquanodons, all scampering on the sand.
Young ones
The ickly, prickly, sickly, stikly, porous ichthyosaurus.
The tactitile, tractile, prophylactile, fractile pterodactyls.
The decorous, sonorous, valorous, amorous, fonto brontosaurus.
Old one
Young ones, stop your silly rhymes,

And cease this interruption.

Your foolish words are nonsense and corruption.
And though I may appear as meek and frail,
I've still the strength to swat you with my tail.
Now where was i? Oh, yes.
All at once the sky turned bright vermillion red,
A comet crashed to earth and all who saw fell dead,
And those of us who still could run,
Turned our backs and fled.
A silent darkness fell and blotted out the sun,
The earth turned barren cold, the ending had begun,
For only little ones found food, the rest were all undone.
Ptarandon tumbled lifeless from the sky.
Tyrannosaurs rex could only fall and die.
And sweet proceratops bid us a sad goodbye.
Young ones
The most dramatic,
Most erratic,
Most phlegmatic,
Most fanatic,
Quite complex,
Tyrannosaurs rex.
(Hay diddle, diddle, diddle, hay diddle di,
Hay diddle, diddle, diddle, hay diddle di)
That ickly, prickly,
Somewhat sickly,
Trickly, dickly,
Moving quickly,
Paragon,
The ptaradon.
(Hay diddle, diddle, diddle, hay diddle di,
Hay diddle, diddle, diddle, hay diddle di)
That never slow-toe,
Vertigo-toe
Embryo-toe
Horns instead of chops
Protoceratops.
Old one

I warned you, I warned you, you foolish little clods.

I warned you, I warned you, you silly suropods.
Why yet you do not understand and cease this interruption.
You're foolish rhymes are only nonsense and corruption.
Beware, beware and shudder to your soul,
Beware, beware, they come and take control,
They come, they come, their shadows now appear.
They come, they come, now you shall learn in fear!
Tyrannosaurus rex
Who dares, who dares, who dares to conjure up my face?
Now swear, now swear, now swear allegiance to my grace.
You little nothings, little specks,
You tiny morsels, minor flecks,
Who dares, who dares
To look upon, to look upon,
The high and mighty,
Ever right-y
Tyrannosaur, tyrannosaur, tyrannosaurs rex?
And if you do not honor me with proper recognition,
I'll slash and bash and gnash and lash you into a submission.
For in our ancient pedigree,
I am the patrician.
I stalked the earth, was lord of all that I surveyed,
Every creature either fled me or obeyed,
Everyone an acolyte, or their face I would bite.
I roamed the land, my power did not know an end,
When one has power, one does not need a friend,
The only friend of worth,
Is a belly with a girth.
So when strangers happened by,
I would ply them with the finest wines and lunch,
But wine inside me sets my teeth to start to crunch,
And their sorry fate,
Was to end up on my plate.
You little ones I see,
Come and sit upon my shoulders and my lap,
Soon you'll see I am a very friendly chap,
The fabled battles I have won,
Have been all fought for fun.

Be a new devotee,
Come, and see how I can make you part of me,
Take my claw,
Feel my might,
I'll be quick with my bite.
Let me teach you, let me teach you,
Come to me so I might reach you,
See, I fade, yet still I yearn,
What did you learn? What did you learn?
Tyrannosaurs, king is gone,
Let my memory live on,
Let my memory live on.
Old ones
We see your faces glow with terror,
Now you see you've made an error,
Never scoff and never spurn,
What did you learn?
What did you learn?
Young ones
What did we learn? That's easy.
Oh, never take a carnivore to lunch.
Cause carnivores have jaws that like to crunch.
They'll trunche on you, they'll punch on you,
Their jagged teeth'll munch on you,
So never take a carnivore to lunch.
Oh, never take a carnivore to tea.
Though eager he may be for company.
He'll salivate and masticate,
You'll end up on his dinner plate,
A pity, that will be the end of thee.
Oh, never take a carnivore to dine.
Cause carnivores are often not benign.
You'll be pate upon a tray,
A pretty petite dejeuner,
If you are asked, just say that you decline.
Chorus

Silence, silence, silence!

What massive shadows come to fill the space?
What countless herds at quickened, cruising pace?
A sea of life; a vast domain,
The eye cannot contain.
This herd of ipsolophodons,
In search of food, in search of drink,
They do not turn, they do not shrink,
A single purpose is their link,
These slick and quick automatons.
Female solo (alto)
A gentler face is conjured now,
With graceful form and soothing brow,
The paragon in ancestor,
The mayasaur, the mayasaur,
The gentle, nurturing, mayasaur.
With simple ways and gentle eye,
She sits with patience on her nest,
She gathers young ones to her breast,
She brings them food at their behest,
She hums a gentle lullaby.
Triceratops (baritone)
Nature freed me from attack,
By putting armor on my back,
And crown of bone to offer one fine whack!
But it's tough to move from place to place,
And tougher still, to find embrace,
With a bird-like beak and an ugly, three horned face.
As triceratops, I say,
Not even rex got in my way,
Yes even rex would quicken pace,
When chased buy a three horned face.
Triceratops/stegosaurus
(Baritone/tenor duet)
Wasn't it fun to prance and clank,
An armored tank, an armored tank?
Wasn't it neat to heave and cleave,

In a world of make believe?

Wasn't it fine to munch and dine,
On gingko leaves, on climbing vine?
Wasn't it great to run scot-free,
In cretaceous reverie?
Stegosaurus
With me the plates upon my back,
Were hard as rock, and strong as steel.
If any bit me, I'd bequeath,
A mouth of broken teeth.
With two foot spikes upon my tail,
A solid whack would make my point,
As stegosaurus, I'd commute,
The start of all dispute.
Triceratops/stegosaurus
Wasn't it fun to prance and clank,
An armored tank, an armored tank?
Wasn't it neat to heave and cleave,
In a world of make believe?
Wasn't if fine to munch and dine,
On gingko leaves, on climbing vine?
Wasn't it great to run scot-free,
In cretaceous reverie?
Chorus
Through the fogs that billow up from earth,
Through warm mists that hang above the bog,
The outline of a creature comes.
It lumbers slowly on the fern lush shore,
The brontosaur, the brontosaur,
What awesome length,
What awesome size,
The brontosaurus magnifies,
A symbol of our strength.
Brontosaurus
They called me, thunder lizard, for my size.
T'is true, the land would shake beneath my stride.

But I was never bound to marsh or bog,

For land bound vegetation was my prize.
I needed more than most to fill my plate.
I'd wander far and wide for choices green,
Called both swamp and forest my demesne.
But as the weather cooled, so did the earth.
In lush and steamy valleys lost,
The leaves turned black and fell in frost,
Bereft of warmth, bereft of mirth,
In time we fell, in time we fell,
Through frosted breath,
We saw the face of death.
Young ones
These fantasies from ancient days,
Have frightened us and taught us.
You've conjured up the ancient ways,
With ancestors that sought us.
But that was then and this is now,
Your visions overawe us.
Now conjure up and now allow,
The one they called, thesaurus.
The one they called, thesaurus.
Old ones
With head bowed low and reverence in our eyes,
With memories, through haze and misty time,
With all the passions that our lives have brought us,
We summon now,
Come forth, come forth,
Oh wondrous thesaurus.
In song or allegory,
Come tell your wondrous story.
Come tell your wondrous story.
Thesaurus
I cannot speak or tell or say,
My countenance, face, my visage, pale,

My walk, my stride, my gait display,

I creep, I crawl with pace of snail.
My terms, my phrase, my words assail,
I will not make it through my story,
And lest you start to sleep or wail,
For me, pour moi, you speak my glory.
You tell the tale of this valiant bird,
For I can only repeat my words.
Quartet
(Soprano, alto, baritone and base)
Once upon jurassic time,
The time of feathered dinosaurs,
Twas then evolved, a master stroke,
A dinosaur, a gentle folk,
A dinosaur who spoke.
Throughout our hundred million years,
The years we freely wandered earth,
We'd grunt, we'd groan in manner terse,
We'd shriek, we'd hiss or even worse,
And thus we would converse.
You know of course that hadrosaur,
Through tubal crest would sound alarm,
You know that archaeopteryx,
With cheerful chirp,
Had magic charm.
But only one, a feathered bird,
And only one was truly heard,
'Cause only he could form a word,
And oh, what words occurred.

Solo parts
(Some spoken with
Background music,
Some sung)
All dinosaurs were not alike,
Most you could not sweeten,
And making friends with some of them,
Could easily get you eaten.

But only one could be a friend,

It never make a fuss,
He lived upon the crystal air,
This was the the-sau-rus.
He was polite as he could be,
On walks he'd glide before us,
And young ones all would shout with glee,
Here comes our friend, thesaurus.
He loved to laugh, he loved to joke,
He acted on his whims.
At times he chose to speak in rhymes,
At times in synonyms.
A synonym is just a word,
Replacing just some other,
Like mommy, mom, or ma, or ma'am,
Or maybe simply, mother.
This marvel of the reptile world,
Spoke synonyms while grinning,
This happened in jurassic time,
When language was beginning.
For up till then when reptiles spoke,
There wasn't much selection.
We had a word for being, "sick",
But not one for, "infection."
We could say words like, "turning tricks",
But none said, "acrobatic."
We could say, "water" when it rained,
But no one knew, "aquatic."
There was a need, they shook their heads,
Agreeing with velocity,
That with new words they could create,
A thing they'd call, "verbosity."
The dinosaurs approached with care,
They offered cakes and sherry.
And begged him to agree to write,
A new type dictionary.

To this he said he would agree,

And promised not to bore us.
Provided that all honor go,
To only the thesaurus.
He scratched the words on walls and floors,
So none would be forgotten.
He rewrote books and also songs,
Improved by polyglotten.
The language grew by leaps and bounds,
So everyone was merry.
And soon all reptiles bragged about,
Their huge vocabulary.
And so today we honor him,
For service meritorious,
For he enabled us to be,
Loquacious, glib and glorious.

Finale
Full chorus
Spirits of the ancient ones,
That move upon the gathering clouds,
Ghostly proof of glory past,
Have spoken through the mist and shroud.
Raise your eyes and see them clearly,
Cleave the crystal morning air,
See them rise from earth to heaven,
Feathered minions sweet and rare.
Giants fell to their extinction,
Yet one creature did revive,
Nature chose the Truadon,
And through this creature, we survive.
Dinosaur of song and story,
Praise him for his majesty,
Evolution into glory,
Fortunate ascendency.
Rise up, rise up on the wind,
Rise up, rise up on the wind,
We live and we testify,

To the dinosaurs in the sky.

Rise up, rise up on the wind,
Rise up, rise up on the wind,
We live and we testify,
To the dinosaur birds of the sky.
Spirits of the ancient ones,
That gather on the sun-lit clouds.
Ghostly proof of glories past,
Have spoken through the mist and shroud.
Raise your eyes and see them clearly,
Dancing on the morning air,
See them rise from earth to heaven,
Dinosaurs all sweet and rare.
Dinosaurs all sweet and rare.
Dinosaurs all sweet and rare.