[1] All of us are born of women, have few days, and are full of turmoil. [2] Like a flower, we bloom, then wither, flee like a shadow, and don’t last. ( [3] Yes, you open your eyes on this one; you bring me into trial against you.) [4] Who can make pure from impure? Nobody. [5] If our days are fixed, the number of our months with you, you set a statute and we can’t exceed it. [6] Look away from us that we may rest, until we are satisfied like a worker at day’s end. [7] Indeed there is hope for a tree. If it’s cut down and still sprouting and its shoots don’t fail, [8] if its roots age in the ground and its stump dies in the dust, [9] at the scent of water, it will bud and produce sprouts like a plant. [10] But a human dies and lies there; a person expires, and where is he? [11] Water vanishes from the sea; a river dries up completely. [12] But a human lies down and doesn’t rise until the heavens cease; they don’t get up and awaken from sleep. [13] I wish you would hide me in the underworld, conceal me until your anger passes, set a time for me, and remember me. [14] If people die, will they live again? All the days of my service I would wait until my restoration took place. [15] You would call, and I would answer you; you would long for your handiwork. [16] Though you now number my steps, you would not keep a record of my sin. [17] My rebellion is sealed in a bag; you would cover my sin. [18] But an eroding mountain breaks up, and rock is displaced. [19] Water wears away boulders; floods carry away soil; you destroy a people’s hope. [20] You overpower them relentlessly, and they die; you change their appearance and send them away. [21] Their children achieve honor, and they don’t know it; their children become insignificant, and they don’t see it. [22] They only feel the pain of their body, and they mourn for themselves.
