Consider: who has perished when he was innocent?
Where have the honest been destroyed?

Since I cannot help myself,
the hope for success has been banished from me.

They are ashamed because they had been confident of finding water.
When they arrive there, they are frustrated.

So I have been made to inherit months of futility,
and troubled nights have been assigned to me.

“Why did You bring me out of the womb?
I should have died and never been seen.

I wish I had never existed
but had been carried from the womb to the grave.

My days have slipped by;
my plans have been ruined,
even the things dear to my heart.

Even after my skin has been destroyed,
yet I will see God in my flesh.

the joy of the wicked has been brief
and the happiness of the godless has lasted only a moment?

If my heart has been seduced by my neighbor’s wife
or I have lurked at his door,

Be careful that you do not turn to iniquity,
for that is why you have been tested by affliction.

Have the gates of death been revealed to you?
Have you seen the gates of deep darkness?

She treats her young harshly, as if they were not her own,
with no fear that her labor may have been in vain.