If they could only see me now....

Athletic, bright, youthful and free

This is how I used to be.

As free as the river flowing down this cliff face

I have aged and cannot keep up this pace

Unlike this waterfall as beautiful and as thunderous as the day it was conceived

I now have greying hair and crows feet not to be believed

I used to thunder in my own right, being heard no matter anyone's might

My thunder now a murmur, my force now likely a farce

I recoil at the thought of what once was,

bringing understanding to recognition that I'll never be again

Unlike this waterfall as beautiful and as thunderous as the day it was conceived

I peel away like the leaves from the trees

I peel away slowly, and become an observer

An observer of my new seedlings

They roar like this thunderous waterfall

Filled with the vitality and frivolity I no longer have in me

Their fervor I admire and hope for them it continues

The waterfall is now mine to watch, I can be it no longer

Unlike this waterfall as beautiful and as thunderous as the day it was conceived

I have slowed to a trickle, a murmur slowly ceasing to be heard

I revel in their youth and exhuberance, their liberty and song

I sit along side this stream, on this rock I now belong

Sedimentary, complimentary, I am where I belong

In the underbrush of life, rather than in the fierceness of the flow

I can only say "These kids are what I have to show"

For the life I have lived has been blessed with such things

As wonderful as my wife and a girl with her sibling

I can no longer ask for more than my lot

I am just so happy I got what I got!