Ozymandias

[le Voyageur]

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.

Percy Bysshe Shelly

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdQKUvv3bew

 

[Oldscout448]

Always loved the double meaning.   Although his works at their zenith may have been impossible for even the "mighty " to equal,  now there remains of them almost nothing.   Even the greatest of rulers and builders die and are forgotten.  Their vast kingdoms return to the endless sands of time.