es noticed are the rhyming end lines that follow an ABAB pattern. This rhyming helps the poem flow and move along.The first use of repetition can be seen in the first two lines, with the word “chartered” (1-2). In this case the two words both have the same meaning but this is not always the case throughout the poem. Blake uses “chartered street” (1) and “chartered Thames” (2) to describe public places to which everyone has rights and privileges (chartered). Another meaning of “chartered” (1-2) that becomes more obvious as we read further into the poem is that of a chart or map. Webster’s dictionary says a chart is a sheet giving information, form this we can deduce that the Thames or streets have information to give (chart). The last two lines of this first stanza have more repetition with the words mark and marks. The speaker “mark(ing)” (3) every face is noticing the features or characterizing the people he meets. The speaker than “marks” (4) or sees a visible clues. What the speaker sees is “weakness” and “woe” (4). Woe can possibly be seen visually as in sadness, sorrow, or grief on the peoples faces, but weakness is not really a visual sign. From Websters we find weakness means lacking in strength or vigor (weakness). We learn later in the poem that this weekness is not referring to physical strength but to mental strength. After traveling about the public streets of London near the Thames river and characterizing the features of weakness, sorrow, and grief, in the people he passes the speaker delves deeper into the issues of these people in the second stanza. Rhyme and repetition continue as the speaker hears how men cry and Infants cry of fear. Blake’s uses of the word cry in the “cry of every Man” (5) can bee seen in two ways. The first meaning of cry is to call out or proclaim. In other words t...
