Lamentations 1:11-16

The Voice

¹¹ Kept in hunger,
    her people are desperate for food.
Once prosperous, they trade her treasures
    for nourishment of any kind.

Lady Jerusalem: Look, Eternal One—
        really see how hated I’ve become.

¹²     Look around, you who pass by and go about your business.
        Is there any sorrow as great as mine?
    Any pain as great as that which has been forced on me?
        No. Because my pain comes from the Eternal.
    It is His judgment, rendered on the day of His intense anger.

¹³     My bones burn with the wrath of God,
        the fire sent from on high.
    He laid a trap, then left me,
        turned me back to the destruction,
    With the shakes, constantly sick and faint.

¹⁴     Now the burden of all my wrongs is a yoke.
        God has laid them upon my shoulders,
    Bound them around my neck.
        He has made sure I’m too weak to support them.
    The Lord gave me into the hand of an enemy.
        I could not resist.

¹⁵     Overwhelmed by none other than God,
        the Lord has determined that all my warriors are worthless.
    He has summoned a meeting of those who are against me
        to crush the young men who would protect me,
    And He has stomped lovely Judah, virgin daughter,
        like grapes in a winepress.

¹⁶     Pity, my eyes won’t stop their crying; I can’t stop.
        There is no one nearby to comfort me or revive my spirit,
    No one to pull me up.
        My children know it—they’re left empty,
    The enemy has won.