^1. «BUT now those younger than I mock me, Whose fathers I disdained to put with the dogs of my flock.

^2. «Indeed, what good was the strength of their hands to me? Vigor had perished from them.

^3. «From want and famine they are gaunt Who gnaw the dry ground by night in waste and desolation,

^4. Who pluck [1] mallow by the bushes, And whose food is the root of the broom shrub.

^5. «They are driven from the community; They shout against them as against a thief,

^6. So that they dwell in dreadful [2] valleys, In holes of the earth and of the rocks.

^7. «Among the bushes they [3] cry out; Under the nettles they are gathered together.

^8. « [5] Fools, even [4] those without a name, They were scourged from the land.

^9. «And now I have become their [6] taunt, I have even become a byword to them.

^10. «They abhor me and stand aloof from me, And they do not [7] refrain from spitting at my face.

^11. «Because [10] He has loosed [9] His [8] bowstring and afflicted me, They have cast off the bridle before me.

^12. «On the right hand their [11] brood arises; They thrust aside my feet and build up against me their ways of destruction.

^13. «They break up my path, They profit [12] from my destruction; No one restrains them.

^14. «As through a wide breach they come, [13] Amid the tempest they roll on.

^15. « Terrors are turned against me; They pursue my [15] honor as the wind, And my [14] prosperity has passed away like a cloud.

^16. «And now my soul is poured out [16] within me; Days of affliction have seized me.

^17. «At night it pierces my bones [17] within me, And my gnawing pains take no rest.

^18. «By a great force my garment is distorted; It binds me about as the collar of my coat.

^19. «He has cast me into the mire, And I have become like dust and ashes.

^20. «I cry out to You for help, but You do not answer me; I stand up, and You turn Your attention against me.

^21. «You have [18] become cruel to me; With the might of Your hand You persecute me.

^22. «You lift me up to the wind and cause me to ride; And You dissolve me in a storm.

^23. «For I know that You will bring me to death And to the house of meeting for all living.

^24. «Yet does not one in a heap of ruins stretch out his hand, Or in his disaster therefore cry out for help? 25«Have I not wept for the one whose life is hard? Was not my soul grieved for the needy?

^26. «When I expected good, then evil came; When I waited for light, then darkness came.

^27. «I am seething within and cannot relax; Days of affliction confront me.

^28. «I go about mourning without comfort; I stand up in the assembly and cry out for help.

^29. «I have become a brother to jackals And a companion of ostriches.

^30. «My skin turns black on me, And my bones burn with fever.

^31. «Therefore my harp is turned to mourning, And my flute to the sound of those who weep.