ozymandias

• 'i met a traveller'


  detaching himself from the narrative, its someone else's story, linking to Percy Bysshe Shelley's real view on the monarchy that he couldn't say aloud
• 'antique land'


  suggesting having a ruler is outdated
• 'trunkless legs of stone'


  material is hard wearing, suggesting he wanted to rule forever
• 'near them'


  distance reflecting the time that has passed
• 'shattered visage'


  destroyed over time like the egyptian empire has been
• 'sneer of cold command'


  the arts live on and can tell us what they were like
• 'yet survive'


  sculptors work lives on but the humans are lifeless
• 'hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed'


  mocked, ambiguous meaning, could be Shelley mocking the rulers, or Ramesses II mocking people lower than him
• 'these words appear'


  volta, no longer about the statue
• 'look on my works'


  ironic as the statue isn't his work
• 'I am ozymandias, king of kings' 


  biblical reference, thinks he is mighty and God-like
• 'nothing beside remains'


  emphasises that human life is time bound