2. Yea, whereto should the strength of their hands profit me, men in whom vigour hath perished?
3. Withered up through want and hunger, they flee into waste places long since desolate and desert:
4. They gather the salt-wort among the bushes, and the roots of the broom for their food.
5. They are driven forth from among men--they cry after them as after a thief--
6. To dwell in gloomy gorges, in caves of the earth and the rocks:
7. They bray among the bushes; under the brambles they are gathered together:
8. Sons of fools, and sons of nameless sires, they are driven out of the land.
9. And now I am their song, yea, I am their byword.
10. They abhor me, they stand aloof from me, yea, they spare not to spit in my face.
11. For he hath loosed my cord and afflicted me; so they cast off the bridle before me.
12. At my right hand rise the young brood; they push away my feet, and raise up against me their pernicious ways;
13. They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, without any to help them;
14. They come in as through a wide breach: amid the confusion they roll themselves onward.
15. Terrors are turned against me; they pursue mine honour as the wind; and my welfare is passed away like a cloud.
16. And now my soul is poured out in me; days of affliction have taken hold upon me.
17. The night pierceth through my bones and detacheth them from me, and my gnawing pains take no rest:
18. By their great force they have become my raiment; they bind me about as the collar of my coat.
19. He hath cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes.