Lamentations.
Chapter 2.
ALEPH-BET How the Lord clouds in His anger the daughter of Zion, || He has cast from the heavens to earth the beauty of Israel, || And has not remembered His footstool in the day of His anger. 
The Lord has swallowed up, || He has not pitied any of the pleasant places of Jacob, || He has broken down in His wrath || The fortresses of the daughter of Judah, || He has caused to come to the earth, || He defiled the kingdom and its princes. 
He has cut off in the heat of anger every horn of Israel, || He has turned backward His right hand || From the face of the enemy, || And He burns against Jacob as a flaming fire, || It has devoured all around. 
He has bent His bow as an enemy, || His right hand has stood as an adversary, || And He slays all the desirable ones of the eye, || In the tent of the daughter of Zion, || He has poured out as fire His fury. 
The Lord has been as an enemy, || He has swallowed up Israel, || He has swallowed up all her palaces, || He has destroyed His fortresses, || And He multiplies in the daughter of Judah || Mourning and moaning. 
And He shakes as a garden His dwelling place, || He has destroyed His appointed place, || YHWH has forgotten in Zion the appointed time and Sabbath, || And despises, in the indignation of His anger, king and priest. 
The Lord has cast off His altar, || He has rejected His sanctuary, || He has shut up into the hand of the enemy || The walls of her palaces, || A noise they have made in the house of YHWH || Like a day of appointment. 
YHWH has devised to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion, || He has stretched out a line, || He has not turned His hand from destroying, || And He causes bulwark and wall to mourn, || Together—they have been weak. 
Sunk into the earth have her gates, || He has destroyed and broken her bars, || Her king and her princes are among the nations, || There is no law, also her prophets || Have not found vision from YHWH. 
Sit on the earth—the elderly of Zion’s daughter keep silent, || They have caused dust to go up on their head, || They have girded on sackcloth, || The virgins of Jerusalem have || Put their head down to the earth. 
My eyes have been consumed by tears, || My bowels have been troubled, || My liver has been poured out to the earth, || For the breach of the daughter of my people; In infant and suckling being feeble, || In the broad places of the city, 
To their mothers they say, || “Where are grain and wine?” In their becoming feeble as a pierced one || In the broad places of the city, || In their soul pouring itself out into the bosom of their mothers. 
What do I testify to you, what do I liken to you, || O daughter of Jerusalem? What do I equal to you, and I comfort you, || O virgin daughter of Zion? For great as a sea is your breach, || Who gives healing to you? 
Your prophets have seen for you a false and insipid thing, || And have not revealed concerning your iniquity, || To return your captivity, || And they see for you false burdens and causes of expulsion. 
Everyone passing by the way clapped hands at you, || They have hissed—and they shake the head || At the daughter of Jerusalem: “Is this the city of which they said: The perfection of beauty, a joy to all the land?” 
Opened against you their mouth have all your enemies, || They have hissed, indeed, they gnash the teeth, || They have said: “We have swallowed her up, || Surely this is the day that we looked for, || We have found—we have seen.” 
YHWH has done that which He devised, || He has fulfilled His saying || That He commanded from the days of old, || He has broken down and has not pitied, || And causes an enemy to rejoice over you, || He lifted up the horn of your adversaries. 
Their heart has cried to the Lord; O wall of the daughter of Zion, || Cause to go down tears as a stream daily and nightly, do not give rest to yourself, || Do not let the daughter of your eye stand still. 
Arise, cry aloud in the night, || At the beginning of the watches. Pour out your heart as water, || Before the face of the Lord, || Lift up to Him your hands, for the soul of your infants, || Who are feeble with hunger at the head of all out-places. 
See, O YHWH, and look attentively, || To whom You have acted thus, || Do women eat their fruit, infants of a handbreadth? Slain in the sanctuary of the Lord are priest and prophet? 
Lain on the earth in out-places have young and old, || My virgins and my young men have fallen by the sword, || You have slain in a day of Your anger, || You have slaughtered—You have not pitied. 
You call as at a day of appointment, || My fears from all around, || And there has not been in the day of the anger of YHWH, || An escaped and remaining one, || They whom I stretched out and nourished, || My enemy has consumed! 
