Appreciation of London by William Blake The first stanza of the poem London opens with the image of Blake wandering “through every charter road”. Blake chose the word "charter'd" to convey various images in the readers' minds. The immediate image that the public will see is that the streets of London have been mapped. However, upon further examination, the reader may determine that Blake had another meaning for the word. The verbal charter is also a document that gives certain rights to a city. One perspective the reader might adopt is that the word suggests a city's proud independence. Repetition is one of the most significant features that Blake uses in the poem. Blake's repetition is overbearing, it is also used to emphasize the purposes and images that Blake is trying to express to his audience. Blake repeats the word "mark" twice in the second verse to express different meanings to the audience. The first “sign” is the simple meaning of noticing. However “signs of weakness, signs of pain” are physical signs of suffering that Blake can see into ...