7 Isn’t each person consigned to forced labor^(A) on earth?
Are not his days like those of a hired worker?
² Like a slave he longs for shade;
like a hired worker he waits for his pay.
³ So I have been made to inherit months of futility,
and troubled nights have been assigned to me.^(B)
4 When I lie down I think,
“When will I get up?”
But the evening drags on endlessly,
and I toss and turn until dawn.
⁵ My flesh is clothed with maggots and encrusted with dirt.^[a]
My skin forms scabs^[b] and then oozes.^(C)

⁶ My days pass more swiftly than a weaver’s shuttle;
they come to an end without hope.^(D)
7 Remember that my life is but a breath.
My eye will never again see anything good.^(E)
8 The eye of anyone who looks on me
will no longer see me.
Your eyes will look for me, but I will be gone.^(F)
9 As a cloud fades away and vanishes,
so the one who goes down to Sheol^(G) will never rise again.
¹⁰ He will never return to his house;
his hometown will no longer remember^[c] him.^(H)

¹¹ Therefore I will not restrain my mouth.
I will speak in the anguish of my spirit;
I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

²⁵ My days fly by faster than a runner;^[a](A)
they flee without seeing any good.^(B)
26 They sweep by like boats made of papyrus,
like an eagle swooping down on its prey.^(C)
27 If I said, “I will forget my complaint,
change my expression, and smile,”
²⁸ I would still live in terror of all my pains.^(D)
I know you will not acquit me.^(E)
29 Since I will be found guilty,^(F)
why should I struggle in vain?
³⁰ If I wash myself with snow,
and cleanse my hands with lye,
³¹ then you dip me in a pit of mud,
and my own clothes despise me!

³² For he is not a man like me, that I can answer him,^(G)
that we can take each other to court.
³³ There is no mediator between us,
to lay his hand on both of us.
³⁴ Let him take his rod away from me
so his terror will no longer frighten me.^(H)
35 Then I would speak and not fear him.
But that is not the case; I am on my own.