{Aleph} Alas, how sitteth the city so desolate, that some time was full of people? How is she become like a widow, which was the lady of all nations? How is she brought under tribute, that ruled all lands?

{Zayin} Now doth Jerusalem remember the time of her misery and disobedience, yea the joy and pleasure that she hath had in times past: seeing her people is brought down through the power of their enemy, and there is no man for to help her. Her enemies stand looking at her, and laughing her Sabbath days to scorn.

{Tet} Her skirts are defiled, she remembered not what would follow: therefore is her fall so great, and there is no man to comfort her. O LORD, consider my trouble, for my enemy hath the upper hand.

{Yod} The enemy hath put his hand to all the precious things that she had, yea even before her eyes came the Heathen in and out of the Sanctuary: whom thou, nevertheless, hast forbidden to come within thy congregation.

{Khaf} All her people seek their bread with heaviness, and look: what precious things every man hath, that giveth he for meat to save his life. Consider, O LORD, and see, how vile I am become.

{Mem} From above hath he sent down a fire into my bones: and it burned them cruelly. He hath laid a net for my feet, and thrown me wide open: he hath made me desolate, so that I must ever be mourning.

{Nun} The yoke of my transgression is come at the last; with his hand hath he taken it up, and put it about my neck. My strength is gone: the LORD hath delivered me into those hands, whereout I cannot quit myself.

{Samekh} The LORD hath destroyed all the mighty men, that were in me. He hath proclaimed a feast, to slaughter all my best men. The LORD hath trodden down the daughter of Judah, like as it were in a wine press.

{Ayin} Therefore do I weep, and mine eyes gush out of water: for the comforter that should quicken me is far from me. My children are driven away. For why? The enemy hath gotten the over hand.

{Pe} Zion casteth out her hands, and there is no man to comfort her. The LORD hath laid the enemies round about Jacob, and Jerusalem is as it were a menstruous woman in the midst of them.

{Shin} They hear my mourning, but there is none that will comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble, and are glad thereof, because thou hast done it. But thou shalt bring forth the time, when they also shall be like unto me.

{Aleph} Alas, how hath the LORD darkened the daughter of Zion so sore in his wrath? As for the honour of Israel, he hath casten it down from heaven: How happeneth it, that he remembered not his own foot stool when he was angry?

{Daleth} He hath bent his bow like an enemy, he hath fastened his righthand as an adversary: and everything that was pleasant to see, he hath smitten it down. He hath poured out his wrath like a fire, into the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion.

{He} The LORD is become like as it were an enemy: he hath cast down Israel and all his places. Yea, all his strongholds hath he destroyed, and filled the daughter of Judah with much sorrow and heaviness.

{Vav} Her tabernacle - which was like a garden of pleasure - hath he destroyed; her high solemn feasts hath he put down. The LORD hath brought it so to pass, that the high solemn feasts and Sabbaths in Zion are clean forgotten. In his heavy displeasure hath he made the king and priests to be despised.

{Zayin} The LORD hath forsaken his own altar, and is wroth with his own sanctuary, and hath given the walls of their towers into the hands of the enemy. Their enemies made a noise in the house of the LORD, as it had been in a solemn feast day.

{Khet} The LORD thought to break down the walls of the daughter Zion; he spread out his line, and drew not in his hand, till he had destroyed them. Therefore mourn the turrets and the broken walls together.

{Tet} Her ports are cast down to the ground, her bars are broken and smitten in sunder: her king and princes are carried away to the gentiles. They have neither law nor Prophets, nor yet any vision from the LORD.

{Yod} The Senators of the daughter Zion sit upon the ground in silence: they have strawed ashes upon their heads, and girded themselves with sackcloth. The maidens of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.

{Mem} What shall I say of thee, O thou daughter Jerusalem? To whom shall I liken thee? To whom shall I compare thee, O thou daughter Zion, to comfort thee withal? Thy hurt is like a main sea: who may heal thee?

{Nun} Thy prophets have looked out vain and foolish things for thee: they have not showed thee of thy wickedness, to keep thee from captivity; but have overladen thee, and through falsity scattered thee abroad.

{Samekh} All they that go by thee clap their hands at thee - hissing and wagging their heads upon the daughter Jerusalem - and say, "Is this the city that men call so fair, wherein the whole land rejoiceth?"

{Ayin} All thine enemies gape upon thee, whispering and biting their teeth, saying, "Let us devour, for the time that we looked for is come: we have found and seen it."

{Kuf} Stand up and make thy prayer in the first watch of the night; pour out thine heart like water before the LORD. Lift up thine hands for the lives of thy young children that die of hunger in the streets.

{ Res} Behold, O LORD, and consider: why hast thou gathered me up so clean? Shall the women then eat their own fruit; even children of a span long? Shall the priests and prophets be slain thus in the Sanctuary of the LORD?

{Tav} My neighbours that are round about me hast thou called, as it were to a feast day: so that in the day of the LORD's wrath none escaped, neither was any left behind. Those that I had brought up and nourished, hath mine enemy destroyed.

Against me only he turneth his hand, and layeth it ever upon me.

{Gimel} He hath so hedged me in, that I cannot get out; and hath laid heavy links upon me.

Though I cry and call piteously, yet heareth he not my prayer.

{Daleth} He layeth wait for me like a Bear, and as a lion in a hole.

He hath bent his bow, and made me as it were a mark to shoot at.

He hath put my soul out of rest; I forget all good things.

{Zayin} O remember yet my misery and my trouble; the wormwood and the gall.

O how good is it, with stillness, to wait and tarry for the health of the LORD?

O how good is it, for a man, to take the yoke upon him from his youth up?

{Yod} He sitteth alone, he holdeth him still, and dwelleth quietly by himself.

But though he do cast off, yet according to the multitude of his mercies, he receiveth to grace again.

For he doth not plague, and cast out the children of men from his heart.

{Mem} What is he then that sayeth, "There should something be done without the LORD's commandment:

out of the mouth of the most Highest goeth not evil and good"?

Wherefore then murmureth the living man, let him murmur at his own sin.

Whole rivers of water gush out of mine eyes, for the great hurt of my people.

{Tsadi} Mine enemies hunted me out sharply, like a bird; yea, and that without a cause.

{Kuf} I called upon thy name, O LORD, out of the deep pit.

Persecute them, O LORD, with thine indignation, and root them out from under the heaven.

{Aleph} O how is the gold become so dim? How is the goodly colour of it so sore changed? And the stones of the sanctuary thus scattered in the corner of every street?

{Daleth} The tongues of the sucking children, cleave to the roof of their mouths for very thirst. The young children ask bread, but there is no man that giveth it them.

{Khet} But now their faces are very black: Insomuch, that thou shouldest not know them in the streets. Their skin cleaveth to their bones; It is withered, and become like a dry stock.

{Yod} The women, which of nature are pitiful, have sodden their own children with their hands that they might be their meat, in the miserable destruction of the daughter of my people.

{Khaf} The LORD hath performed his heavy wrath; he hath poured out the furiousness of his displeasure. He hath kindled a fire in Zion, which hath consumed the foundations thereof.

{Lamed} Neither the kings of the earth, nor all the inhabiters of the world, would have believed that the enemy and adversary should have come in at the gates of the city of Jerusalem.

{Samekh} But they cried unto every man, "Flee the staining! Away, get you hence, touch it not! Yea," say they, "ye must be burnt: ye must dwell among the Gentiles, and bide no longer here."

{Pe} Wherefore yet our eyes fail us, while we look for vain help: seeing we be ever waiting upon a people that can do us no good.

{Tsadi} They lay so sharp wait for us, that we can not go safe upon the streets: for our end is come, our days are fulfilled, our end is here.

{Kuf} Our persecutors are swifter than the Eagles of the air, they followed upon us over the mountains, and laid wait for us in the wilderness.

{The Prayer of Jeremiah} Call to remembrance, O LORD, what we have suffered; consider and see our confusion.

We are fain to drink our own water for money, and our own wood must we buy with money.

Servants have the rule of us, and no man delivereth us out of their hands.

Our skin is as it had been burnt in an oven, for very sore hunger.

because of the hill of Zion that is destroyed: Insomuch that the foxes run upon it.

for thou hast now banished us long enough, and hast been sore displeased at us.