1 Remember, O LORD, what has come upon us; look and see our reproach.
2 Our inheritance has passed to strangers, our homes to aliens.
3 Orphans we have become, fatherless; our mothers are like widows.
4 Our water we drink for silver; our wood comes to us at a price.
5 Our pursuers are on our necks; we are weary and given no rest.
6 To Egypt we have given the hand, and to Assyria, to get enough bread.
7 Our fathers sinned and are gone, and we carry their iniquities.
8 Slaves rule over us; there is no one to snatch us out of their hand.
9 With our lives at stake we bring in our bread, because of the sword of the wilderness.
10 Our skin is hot as an oven with the fever of famine.
11 Women in Zion were ravished, young women in the towns of Judah.
12 Officials were hanged by their hands; elders were given no respect.
13 Young men had to carry the mill, and boys stumbled under the wood.
14 The elders have stopped sitting at the gate, the young men their music.
15 The joy of our heart has stopped; our dancing has turned into mourning.
16 The crown of our head has fallen; woe to us, for we have sinned!
17 For this our heart is faint; for these things our eyes are dim,
18 for Mount Zion, which lies desolate; foxes roam over it.
19 But you, O LORD, are enthroned forever; your throne is from generation to generation.
20 Why do you forget us forever, abandon us for length of days?
21 Turn us back to you, O LORD, and we will turn back; renew our days as of old;
22 unless you have utterly rejected us and are exceedingly angry with us.