Percy Bysshe Shelley in Ozymandias presents to us a sonnet in which a traveler finds a ruined statue in the desert and gives its description. The sculpture is of a king named Ozymandias, as suggested by the title of poem, and the traveler looks at the decayed, "half sunk" (Shelley 5) statue in amazement. The poet tries to convey to the readers how everything looses power over time by symbolically using a decayed statue of a king.
             The narrator of this poem tells us that he met the traveler in an antique land and he described the statue to him (Shelley 1). The fact that the poet mentions "an antique land" (Shelley 1), makes us think of the land as really old. So from the starting we get a hint so as to how old the statue is. The poet mentions that the legs were vast, making us think of how powerful the king might have been when alive but the fact that he describes them as trunkless make us think of his lost power (Shelley 2). By doing this, the poet manages to symbolically tell us that the king might have been powerful but lost his power over time and the only thing left is his decayed statue. The poet describes the face of the sculpture as a "shattered visage" (Shelley 4) with "wrinkled lip" (Shelley 5). This shows us how the statue has deteriorated over time.
             The poet also describes the face of statue as having a "frown" (Shelley 4) with "a sneer of cold command" (Shelley 5). This makes us think of the king as being extremely powerful but also cruel. His statue even says, "Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair" (Shelley 11). The author very ironically tells us how the king was very powerful and wanted everyone to do what he tells but instead "his works", the statue, is left as ruins, and he has no power at all. We see how "nothing beside remains" (Shelley 12) remained. Thus, the author is able to convey the message that nothing remains o...