Ozymandias By: Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818) I met a traveler 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 upon 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. |
"On a Stupendous Leg of Granite Discovered Standing by Itself in the Deserts of Egypt, with the Inscription Inserted Below". By: Horace Smith (1818) In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone, Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws, The only shadow that the desert knows:-- "I am the great Ozymandias," saith the stone. "The King of Kings; this mighty City shows The wonders of my hand.-- The City's gone,-- Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose The site of this forgotten Babylon. We wonder,--and some Hunter may express Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness Where London stood, holding the wolf in chace, He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess What powerful but unrecorded race Once dwelt in that annihilated place. |
The Sculptor By: Anonymous A block of marble stood Before the sculptor where he would, He smote with hand well skilled And thus with blow on blow fulfilled The vision of His mind. At first with chisel coarse and stroke Unspared, the corners off He broke And soon the form appeared. And then, with finer tools He wrought And finer yet, until He brought The perfect image forth. So, with unerring skillfulness With cunning hand and sure' 'Tis as the marble growth less The likeness growth more. So God divinely works with those He, in eternal ages chose To show His work of grace, And thus with blow on blow to trace The image of His Son. How blessed to know that He who holds His tools, before His eyes beholds His own beloved one! The cares and sorrows day by day The troubles that o'ershade the way, Together work for good; And nothing e'erby chance befalls The one whom God in purpose calls, In him whose love is found. And when we have the Glory gained, And Christ's full image have attained, We'll praise his sovereign grace, And bless the hand that dealt each blow Upon the marble here below In working out his will. ( This poem was inscribed in the Bible of a martyred missionary in China.) |