Time

I'm not sure that this is a poem, but I didn't know what else to call it. A musing? It's simply something that came to me as I was going upstairs for bed, inspired by a dream of a cheetah chasing me that I'd had the night before.

When we are young, time is a sloth, slow-moving, never seeming to arrive.
The last bell of the school day will never ring. Christmas will never come.

But as we age, time becomes a dog, faithful, usually where we expect it to be, but occasionally surprising us.
The work day is long, but no longer than usual. Events arrive in the time they should.

But when we grow old, time becomes a cheetah and we are the gazelle, faster and faster it runs to catch us.
Celebrations from long ago seem to only have happened yesterday. Minutes pass as we simply walk down the hall.
Days become weeks and weeks become months. Before we realize, years have overtaken us.
The cheetah is chasing, faster and faster, the older we get. And eventually...eventually, it catches us.