High expectations are the
special poison of a meritocracy.
To exceed to survive this draught,
the hemlock drinker must stand
upon the bodies of the falling,
weeping fellows failing.
Flailing deters, when potency
concurs, entering a season
of advancing, entrancing heat.
Besting is a liver's worst death:
it sets apart, by altitudes,
the filtered and the grounds
smashing anything that cannot
rise to breath by breath ascension.
The feeble, the weak, the meek,
without the protection of a valuable one,
will dive, weighted, to the massive
bottom of the concussive pile.
Roman Ryan 