Books of The Bible / Book of Lamentations
1 Yahweh, remember what has happened to us; consider, and see our degradation.
2 Our heritage has passed to strangers, our homes to foreigners.
3 We are orphans, we are fatherless; our mothers are like widows.
4 We have to buy our own water to drink, our own wood we can get only at a price.
5 The yoke is on our necks; we are persecuted; exhausted we are, allowed no rest.
6 We made a pact with Egypt, with Assyria, to have plenty of food.
7 Our ancestors sinned; they are no more, and we bear the weight of their guilt.
8 Slaves rule us; there is no one to rescue us from their clutches.
9 At peril of our lives we earn our bread, by risking the sword of the desert.
10 Our skin is as hot as an oven, from the scorch of famine.
11 The women in Zion have been raped, the young girls in the towns of Judah.
12 Princes have been hanged by their hands; the face of the old has won no respect.
13 Youths have been put to the mill, boys stagger under loads of wood.
14 The elders have deserted the gateway; the young have given up their music.
15 Joy has vanished from our hearts; our dancing has turned to mourning.
16 The crown has fallen from our heads. Alas that ever we sinned!
17 This is why our hearts are sick; this is why our eyes are dim:
18 because Mount Zion is desolate; jackals roam to and fro on it.
19 Yet you, Yahweh, rule from eternity; your throne endures from age to age.
20 Why do you never remember us? Why do you abandon us so long?
21 Make us come back to you, Yahweh, and we will come back. Restore us as we were before!
22 Unless you have utterly rejected us, in an anger which knows no limit.