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Ozymandias
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Antiquity teaches humility as we stand and judge yet mirror fleeting sands. It is always a little jolting to know that we were not the first to think that we are somehow exempt from the rule of mortality, and that the sun will eternally shine upon us highlighting our youth and vigor; and that the intense drama we experience now will someday hold only quaint and passing interest to our long-distant progeny who, standing in their time, will sense some veiled effrontery from our nerve in dying.
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