Ozymandias--Power Doesn't Last Forever

 

POWER!   POWER!  POWER!

Power was addressed long ago by the British poet, Shelley, that seems particularly appropriate as we see the politicians and candidates press for the advantage and the power. 

Ozymandias

--by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), 1818

I met a traveler from an antique land

Who said: Two vast 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:

 "I am Ozymandias, King of Kings.

 Look on my works ye Mighty, and despair." 

 Nothing besides remains. Round the decay

 Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,

 The lone and level sands stretch far away.

 Another British poet, Isaac Watts (1674-1748) had this to say in a few verses of his poem, “Man Frail and God Eternal”: 

The busy tribes of flesh and blood,
With all their cares and fears,
Are carried downward by the flood,
And lost in following years. 

Thy Word commands our flesh to dust:
"Return, ye sons of men!"
All nations rose from earth at first
And turn to earth again. 

Time, like an ever rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten as a dream
Dies at the opening day. 

Like flowery fields the nations stand,
Pleased with the morning light;
The flowers beneath the mower's hand
Lie withering ere 'tis night.

Some wise words to remember—centuries old, still appropriate.