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30‘But now they make sport of me,
   those who are younger than I,
whose fathers I would have disdained
   to set with the dogs of my flock.
² What could I gain from the strength of their hands?
   All their vigour is gone.
³ Through want and hard hunger
   they gnaw the dry and desolate ground,
⁴ they pick mallow and the leaves of bushes,
   and to warm themselves the roots of broom.
⁵ They are driven out from society;
   people shout after them as after a thief.
⁶ In the gullies of wadis they must live,
   in holes in the ground, and in the rocks.
⁷ Among the bushes they bray;
   under the nettles they huddle together.
⁸ A senseless, disreputable brood,
   they have been whipped out of the land.

⁹ ‘And now they mock me in song;
   I am a byword to them.
¹⁰ They abhor me, they keep aloof from me;
   they do not hesitate to spit at the sight of me.
¹¹ Because God has loosed my bowstring and humbled me,
   they have cast off restraint in my presence.
¹² On my right hand the rabble rise up;
   they send me sprawling,
   and build roads for my ruin.
¹³ They break up my path,
   they promote my calamity;
   no one restrains^* them.
¹⁴ As through a wide breach they come;
   amid the crash they roll on.
¹⁵ Terrors are turned upon me;
   my honour is pursued as by the wind,
   and my prosperity has passed away like a cloud.

¹⁶ ‘And now my soul is poured out within me;
   days of affliction have taken hold of me.
¹⁷ The night racks my bones,
   and the pain that gnaws me takes no rest.
¹⁸ With violence he seizes my garment;^*
   he grasps me by^* the collar of my tunic.
¹⁹ He has cast me into the mire,
   and I have become like dust and ashes.
²⁰ I cry to you and you do not answer me;
   I stand, and you merely look at me.
²¹ You have turned cruel to me;
   with the might of your hand you persecute me.
²² You lift me up on the wind, you make me ride on it,
   and you toss me about in the roar of the storm.
²³ I know that you will bring me to death,
   and to the house appointed for all living.

²⁴ ‘Surely one does not turn against the needy,^*
   when in disaster they cry for help.^*
25 Did I not weep for those whose day was hard?
   Was not my soul grieved for the poor?
²⁶ But when I looked for good, evil came;
   and when I waited for light, darkness came.
²⁷ My inward parts are in turmoil, and are never still;
   days of affliction come to meet me.
²⁸ I go about in sunless gloom;
   I stand up in the assembly and cry for help.
²⁹ I am a brother of jackals,
   and a companion of ostriches.
³⁰ My skin turns black and falls from me,
   and my bones burn with heat.
³¹ My lyre is turned to mourning,
   and my pipe to the voice of those who weep.