pedestal, these words appear:
10 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.'
1817 1818
7. I.e., stayed up until the night, envious of their delight, had reluctantly departed. 8. Probably in the old sense: 'to stand in awe of.' 1. According to Diodorus Siculus, Greek historian of the 1st century B.C.E., the largest statue in Egypt had the inscription 'I am Ozymandias, king of kings; if anyone wishes to know what I am and where I lie, let him surpass me in some of my exploits.' Ozymandias was the Greek name for Ramses II of Egypt, 13th century B.C.E.
2. 'The hand' is the sculptor's, who had 'mocked' (both imitated and satirized) the sculptured passions; 'the heart' is the king's, which has 'fed' his passions.
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STANZAS WRITTE N I N DEJECTIO N / 76 9 Stanzas Written in Dejection- December 1818, near Naples' 5The Sun is warm, the sky is clear, The waves are dancing fast and bright, Blue isles and snowy mountains wear The purple noon's transparent might, The breath of the moist earth is light Around its unexpanded buds; Like many a voice of one delight The winds, the birds, the Ocean-floods; The City's voice itself is soft, like Solitude's. iois I see the Deep's untrampled floor With green and purple seaweeds strown; I see the waves upon the shore Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown; I sit upon the sands alone; The lightning of the noontide Ocean Is flashing round me, and a tone Arises from its measured motion, How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion. 2025Alas, I have nor hope nor health Nor peace within nor calm around, Nor that content surpassing wealth The sage2 in meditation found, And walked with inward glory crowned; Nor fame nor power nor love nor leisure? Others I see whom these surround, Smiling they live and call life pleasure: To me that cup has been dealt in another measure. 30Yet now despair itself is mild, Even as the winds and waters are; I could lie down like a tired child 35And weep away the life of care Which I have borne and yet must bear Till Death like Sleep might steal on me, And I might feel in the warm air My cheek grow cold, and hear the Sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony. 40Some might lament that I were cold, As I, when this sweet day is gone,3 Which my lost heart, too soon grown old, Insults with this untimely moan?
1. Shelley's first wife, Harriet, had drowned her-2. Probably the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius self; Clara, his baby daughter with Mary Shelley, (2nd century C.E.) , Stoic philosopher who wrote had just died; and he was plagued by ill health, twelve books of Meditations. pain, financial worries, and the sense that he had 3. I.e., as I will lament this sweet day when it has failed as a poet. gone.
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77 0 / PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
They might lament,?for I am one Whom men love not, and yet regret; Unlike this day, which, when the Sun Shall on its stainless glory set,
45 Will linger though enjoyed, like joy in Memory yet.
1818 1824
A Song: 'Men of England'1
Men of England, wherefore plough For the lords who lay ye low? Wherefore weave with toil and care The rich robes your tyrants wear?
5 Wherefore feed and clothe and save From the cradle to the grave Those ungrateful drones who would Drain your sweat?1nay, drink your blood?
Wherefore, Bees of England, forge
10 Many a weapon, chain, and scourge, That these stingless drones may spoil The forced produce of your toil?
Have ye leisure, comfort, calm, Shelter, food, love's gentle balm? 15 Or what is it ye buy so dear With your pain and with your fear?
The seed ye sow, another reaps; The wealth ye find, another keeps; The robes ye weave, another wears;
20 The arms ye forge, another bears.
Sow seed?but let no tyrant reap: Find wealth?let no impostor heap: Weave robes?let not the idle wear: Forge arms?in your defence to bear.
25 Shrink to your cellars, holes, and cells? In halls ye deck another dwells. Why shake the chains ye wrought? Ye see The steel ye tempered glance on ye.
With plough and spade and hoe and loom 30 Trace your grave and build your tomb
1. This and the two following poems were written ing Shelley's hope for a proletarian revolution, was at a time of turbulent unrest, after the return of originally planned as one of a series for workers. It troops from the Napoleonic Wars had precipitated has become, as the poet wished, a hymn of the a great economic depression. The 'Song,' express-British labor movement.
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TO SlDMOUTH AND CASTLEREAGH / 77 1
And weave your winding-sheet?till fair England be your Sepulchre.
1819 1839
England in 1819
An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying King;1 Princes, the dregs of their dull race, who flow Through public scorn,?mud from a muddy spring; Rulers who neither see nor feel nor know,
s But leechlike to their fainting country cling Till they drop, blind in blood, without a blow. A people starved
