1. "I hate my life. I will be free in my complaining. I will show how bitter I am in my soul when I speak.
2. I will say to God, 'Do not say that I am guilty and punish me. Let me know why You work against me.
3. Do You think it is right for You to make it hard for me, to turn away from the work of Your hands and favor the plans of the sinful?
4. Do You have eyes of flesh? Do You see as a man sees?
5. Are Your days as the days of man, or Your years as man's years,
6. that You should look for my wrongdoing and my sin?
7. You know that I am not guilty, yet there is no one who can take me away from Your hand.
8. 'Your hands put me together and made me, and now would You destroy me?
9. Remember that You have made me as clay. Would You turn me into dust again?
10. Did You not pour me out like milk and make me become hard like cheese?
11. You have given me clothing of skin and flesh, and have tied me together with bones and cord.
12. You have given me life and loving-kindness. Your care has kept my spirit alive.
13. Yet You have hidden these things in Your heart. I know that this is in Your thoughts.
14. If I sin, You would see me, and would not free me from my guilt.
15. If I am sinful, it would be bad for me! If I am right and good, I cannot lift my head for I am filled with shame and see all my trouble.
16. If I would lift up my head, You would hunt me like a lion. Again You would show Your power against me.
17. You would send new ones who would speak against me, and become more angry with me. You would send me more and more trouble.
18. 'Why then did You let me be born? If only I had died and no one had seen me!
19. I should have been as if I had never lived, carried from my mother to the grave.'
20. Are not my days few? Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort
21. before I go to a place from which I will not return. I will go to the land of darkness and shadow.
22. It is the land of complete darkness and shadow and trouble, where the light is darkness."