Portal:London/Quote/08 2010

I wander through each chartered street, Near where the chartered Thames does flow, And mark in every face I meet, Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every man, In every infant's cry of fear, In every voice, in every ban, The mind-forged manacles I hear:

How the chimney-sweeper's cry Every blackening church appals, And the hapless soldier's sigh Runs in blood down palace-walls.

But most, through midnight streets I hear How the youthful harlot's curse Blasts the new-born infant's tear, And blights with plagues the marriage-hearse. William Blake (1757-1827), London (1792).


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