Through this poem, Owen was able to evoke emotions through the use of imagery, as well as the usages of literary devices. Owen's use of irony in the word "anthem" in the title is his protest to war and horror against the deaths of youth. This poem is written in a form of Sonnets, a 14-line verse with conventional rhyme scheme, to express Owen's feelings about young soldiers going to war. This is also an irony, because sonnets are mainly about love. The poem is describing how the youth in the war is truly doomed, and they are not really cared. "Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs" meant that nobody will mourn for them unless someone in their family died. "Anthem for doomed youth" showed an interesting perspective of life through grief and lost of loved ones and the feeling of "nothing matters anymore".
Owen described the amount of young deaths in war as "these who die as cattle". A cattle being slaughtered is a parallel for those young soldiers who died in the war. "What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?" showed that even the bell of the end of war does not matter anymore to those who died, "Only the monstrous anger of the gunsCan patter out their hasty orisons." only the sound of rifles and guns could show their true feeling about the warm, which is monstrous anger, not sadness. In here, we could see his use of personification and onomatopoeia. These literary devices showed great importance of diction used in order to express one's feelings. "What candles may be held to speed them allshall shine the holy glimmers of good byes." This is a metaphor, showing what use of ritual ceremonies is necessary to show grief when so much had been loss. You can see straight in the eyes and in the "The pallor of girls' brows" that deaths mattered most. .
The imagery is clearly seen as an image of people in grief. From the words "choirs", "prayers", and "bells", we can picture an image of churches.