³ “Let the day when I was born be annihilated,
    along with the night when it was announced,
        ‘It’s a boy!’^[c]
4 Let that day be dark;
    let God above not care about it;
        let no light shine over it.
⁵ Let darkness and deep gloom reclaim it;
    let clouds settle down on it;
        let blackness in mid-day terrify it.
⁶ Let darkness carry that night away;
    let it not take its place joyfully among the days of the year;
        let it not be entered into the calendar.^[d]

⁷ “Yes, let that night be barren;
    let it not appear with its joyful shout.
⁸ Let whoever curses days curse it—
    those who are ready to awaken monsters.^[e]
9 Let the stars of its evening twilight be dark;
    let it hope for light but let there be none;
        let it not see the breaking rays^[f] of the dawn.

¹⁰ “Because that night^[g] refused to shut the doors of my mother’s^[h] womb;
    it failed to keep me from seeing this trouble.
¹¹ Why didn’t I die while I was still in the womb,
    or die while I was being born?
¹² Why was there a lap^[i] to hold me,
    and why were there breasts to nurse me?

¹³ “If I had died,^[j] I would be lying down by now,
    undisturbed, asleep, and at rest,
¹⁴ along with kings and counselors of the earth,
    who used to build for themselves what are now only^[k] ruins,
¹⁵ or princes who amassed^[l] gold for themselves,
    and who kept filling their houses with silver.

¹⁶ “Or why was I not buried^[m] like a stillborn child,^[n]
    like babies^[o] who never saw the light?
¹⁷ In that place, the wicked stop causing trouble,
    and there, those whose strength is exhausted are at rest.
¹⁸ In that place, those who once were prisoners will be at ease together;
    they won’t hear the voice of oppressors.
¹⁹ The unimportant and the important are both there,
    and the servant is free from his master.

²⁰ “Why does God^[p] give light to the sufferer
    or life to the bitter person:
²¹ To those who are longing for death—
    even though it does not come?
To those who search for it
    more than for hidden treasure?
²² To those who are happy beyond measure^[q]
    when they reach their graves?
²³ To the formerly successful^[r] man who lost his way in life,
    and God fenced him in?

²⁴ “As far as I’m concerned, my food comes to me in the form of sighs,
    and my cries of anguish pour out like water.
²⁵ For the dreaded thing that I feared has happened to me,
    what caused me to worry has engulfed^[s] me.
²⁶ I will not be at ease;
    I will not be quiet;
I will not rest;
    because trouble has arrived.”