Ode to a Cheetah

O’ Cheetah sitting on your perch

Watching and yawning under the bright hot sun

Your teeth are long and your fur yellow ochre

Breathing deeply and clicking your claws

To the ground, O’ Cheetah, you stretch your long limbs

Hunched and silent and stalking you wait

Ears flicked back, blinking amber eyes

A breath, you’re striding

A breath, you drop and careen

Your paws hardly seem to touch the ground

As a blur to my eye you dash your prey down

Victory at hand, the day is won for you

With the sun gleaming blood red you turn

To the savannah and disappear in the brush

Black-tipped tail streaking in contrast to the long grass

All is silent in the dying of the night