Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Viva Ozymandias!

I

A few hours later, through Babylonian desert
And confluent arteries, pilgrims blown by trade-winds
To the fusion of inert gases and electrical tension
That ignites one word, appearing and disappearing,
On a pedestal of plastic and dark bolted steel.

Two vast and pointless pylons shoot searchlights
Into the restricted airspace stars have neglected,
Where angels dare not venture, holy creatures blinded
By the fire-fly desert city whose refracted visage
Glowers into the darkness, a glowing eye from space.

A labyrinth of temples complicates the surface
That perspires through the night and mocks the dawn,
Mocks the works of the dead, a masque of death,
Parody of life lived apart from sweating masses,
The great pawns of history tread their faltering paces.

At the pulsing heart of the teeming desert city
The twin ziggurats are counting, one by one by one,
The blurring roll of tributes to unknown emperors,
Counting the germinating souls sacrificing
At the altar no man-god will deign to forsake.

II

Too hot for outdoors and with nothing on the telly,
I sneak to the toilet-stalls and inscribe the words of Shelley.

Thanks for reading,
Dave.