Life is a constant act of forfeiture.
We each begin as a singularity,
A concentration of pure potential,
In that moment, truly equal.

An instant later, the timer starts,
The years of our lives begin to drain away,
And thereafter we can know only the effects of our own clocks, and others', trickling sand across the sepulchre.

For me, this has long been the truth of all things.

Except you.

You came after me,
And so,
Years after my hourglass was turned over,
The trend was reversed.

You did not give me immortality,
That would be ridiculous.
The gift you gave me was far more simple and pure.

For every moment you were on this earth,
The hourglass meant nothing to me.

Every moment spent, was one spent watching you grow,
Learn,
Live.

Every child watches their parents age, unto infirmity,
Unto death.

For some parents, I know,
To watch a child grow into adulthood is to be reminded of their own aging, and encroaching mortality.

A sibling has a unique perspective.

I was not so much older than you as to feel old while watching you grow.

I was not close enough in age to you,
As to feel as though we were the same kind of creature.

A child's memory is a cloth which quickly frays and fades in colour;
As you grew and learnt, I did not remember my own passage through those stages,
And so all of your stages were new to me.

As I matured, I came to recognise what this meant to me.
I became engrossed in the observation of your life.

I discovered, with joy, that you were destined to outstrip me in every way.
Taller, stronger, smarter, more beautiful, more eloquent, more kind, and intrinsically good.

You put your grains of sand to better use than I did mine.
With every passing day, you gained strength.

And then, it was over.

And I realised that part of it had been an illusion.

You were real, of course.

None of what you were was diminished by this realisation.
If anything,
It only made you more valiant in my eyes.

Because you had been taken in, too.

The illusion was this:
As each of our lives is an hourglass on a table,
Yours and mine standing side by side,
Each appeared to hold about the same amount of sand.

It was a very convincing lie.

You lived your life as I have lived mine,
Making plans decades ahead,
Looking forward to a career, love, offspring,
Even so far as retirement.

The day you died, the truth was revealed;
That even at the instant you passed,
The lower hollow of my hourglass held more sand,
Than any part of yours ever would.

And that was the cruellest truth, for you.

The younger sibling spends all of their life,
Catching up to the elder.

Reaching every milestone in their wake.

The day you were born, I was two years and nine months ahead of you.

And you would never catch up.