Ozymandias and ponder, darling,these busted statues

Percy Shelly’ Ozymandias, focuses on how time outlives the world and everyone in it. Time is never specifically mentioned in the poem; however, imagery conveys the destructive nature of time. Most prominently, indications of an extensive progression of time are portrayed by the ancient runes in the poem. The words read off of a pedestal “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: - Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” present the destruction caused by time. The pedestal, a faint token of the past, is all that remains of what can be assumed a once magnificent statue. The pedestal and the words read off of it serve to signify the existence of an extraordinary past, while the fact that the actual statue has been destroyed signifies the ruinous nature of time. Ozymandias expresses a cynical view of time's destructive effect on the ever-fading glimmer of the past.