¹ And now I am the laughing-stock of people who are younger than I am and whose parents I would have disdained to put with the dogs guarding my flock.

² And what use to me was the strength of their hands? - enfeebled as they were,

³ worn out by want and hunger, for they used to gnaw the roots of the thirsty ground -- that place of gloom, ruin and desolation-

⁴ they used to pick saltwort among the scrub, making their meals off roots of broom.

⁵ Outlawed from human company, which raised hue and cry against them, as against thieves,

⁶ they made their homes in the sides of ravines, in holes in the earth or in clefts of rock.

⁷ You could hear them braying from the bushes as they huddled together in the thistles.

⁸ Children of scoundrels, worse, nameless people, the very outcasts of society!

⁹ And these are the ones who now make up songs about me and use me as a byword!

¹⁰ Filled with disgust, they keep their distance, on seeing me, they spit without restraint.

¹¹ And since God has loosened my bow-string and afflicted me, they too throw off the bridle in my presence.

¹² Their brats surge forward on my right, to see when I am having a little peace, and advance on me with threatening strides.

¹³ They cut off all means of escape seizing the chance to destroy me, and no one stops them.

¹⁴ They move in, as if through a wide breach, and I go tumbling beneath the rubble.

¹⁵ Terror rounds on me, my confidence is dispersed as though by the wind, my hope of safety vanishes like a cloud.

¹⁶ And now the life in me trickles away, days of grief have gripped me.

¹⁷ At night-time sickness saps my bones I am gnawed by wounds that never sleep.

¹⁸ Violently, he has caught me by my clothes, has gripped me by the collar of my coat.

¹⁹ He has thrown me into the mud; I am no more than dust and ashes.

²⁰ I cry to you, and you give me no answer; I stand before you, but you take no notice.

²¹ You have grown cruel to me, and your strong hand torments me unmercifully.

²² You carry me away astride the wind and blow me to pieces in a tempest.

²³ Yes, I know that you are taking me towards death, to the common meeting-place of all the living.

²⁴ Yet have I ever laid a hand on the poor when they cried out for justice in calamity?

²⁵ Have I not wept for those whose life is hard, felt pity for the penniless?

²⁶ I hoped for happiness, but sorrow came; I looked for light, but there was darkness.

²⁷ My stomach seethes, is never still, days of suffering have struck me.

²⁸ Sombre I go, yet no one comforts me, and if I rise in the council, I rise to weep.

²⁹ I have become brother to the jackal and companion to the ostrich.

³⁰ My skin has turned black on me, my bones are burnt with fever.

³¹ My harp is tuned to dirges, my pipe to the voice of mourners.