I went to dinner with a musician friend last night. The conversation wandered toward fame and fortune.

What is the point of fame when we will all be forgotten?

I brought up one of my favorite poems: Ozymandias. It’s the tale of a desert traveler who comes upon the ruins of Ramses II’s statue in Egypt. The inscription reads:

I am Ozymandias, King of Kings. Beware my works, ye mighty, and despair.

And nothing but sand and ruins remained.

To me, the poem is a stark reminder: time erodes everything. None of us stay mighty forever.

My friend, however, had a different take: that nothing but the moment matters, a largely Buddhist sentiment. Immortalization is an illusion.

Trying to make ourselves eternal is futile.

Meaning lives in the making—not the memory.

We are all mandalas—works of art made for the now, only to be swept away.