30:1  "But now they make sport of me, men who are younger than I, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock.

30:2  What could I gain from the strength of their hands, men whose vigor is gone?

30:3  Through want and hard hunger they gnaw the dry and desolate ground;

30:4  they pick mallow and the leaves of bushes, and to warm themselves the roots of the broom.

30:5  They are driven out from among men; they shout after them as after a thief.

30:6  In the gullies of the torrents they must dwell, in holes of the earth and of the rocks.

30:7  Among the bushes they bray; under the nettles they huddle together.

30:8  A senseless, a disreputable brood, they have been whipped out of the land.

30:9  "And now I have become their song, I am a byword to them.

30:10  They abhor me, they keep aloof from me; they do not hesitate to spit at the sight of me.

30:11  Because God has loosed my cord and humbled me, they have cast off restraint in my presence.

30:12  On my right hand the rabble rise, they drive me forth, they cast up against me their ways of destruction.

30:13  They break up my path, they promote my calamity; no one restrains them.

30:14  As through a wide breach they come; amid the crash they roll on.

30:15  Terrors are turned upon me; my honor is pursued as by the wind, and my prosperity has passed away like a cloud.

30:16  "And now my soul is poured out within me; days of affliction have taken hold of me.

30:17  The night racks my bones, and the pain that gnaws me takes no rest.

30:18  With violence it seizes my garment; it binds me about like the collar of my tunic.

30:19  God has cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes.

30:20  I cry to thee and thou dost not answer me; I stand, and thou dost not heed me.

30:21  Thou hast turned cruel to me; with the might of thy hand thou dost persecute me.

30:22  Thou liftest me up on the wind, thou makest me ride on it, and thou tossest me about in the roar of the storm.

30:23  Yea, I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living.

30:24  "Yet does not one in a heap of ruins stretch out his hand, and in his disaster cry for help?

30:25  Did not I weep for him whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?

30:26  But when I looked for good, evil came; and when I waited for light, darkness came.

30:27  My heart is in turmoil, and is never still; days of affliction come to meet me.

30:28  I go about blackened, but not by the sun; I stand up in the assembly, and cry for help.

30:29  I am a brother of jackals, and a companion of ostriches.

30:30  My skin turns black and falls from me, and my bones burn with heat.

30:31  My lyre is turned to mourning, and my pipe to the voice of those who weep.