london

• structure - controlled alternating rhyme scheme and regular quatrains used to mimic the monotony and inescapable nature of suffering and oppression
• "Marks of weakness, marks of woe."


  anaphora - Industrial Revolution has stripped the people of their freedom
• "runs in blood down Palace walls"


  metaphor - Blake didactically lambasts the corrupt monarchy as responsible for deaths snd suffering
• "In every cry of every Man" "In every Infant's cry of fear" "In every voice: in every ban"


  anaphora elucidates the incessant suffering, creating a bleak tone and sense of futility
• "mind forged manacles"


  metaphor - freedom of thought has been oppressed by the Industrial Revolution, which was not welcomed by the Romantics as it censored the sublime of nature
• "Marriage hearse"


  oxymoron - marriage linked to death, which implies that children born from marriage are doomed to incessant suffering.
• The observational poem exposes the stark dichotomy between those in power and those suffering at the hands of those in power - Blake confronts the reader with their own passivity.