9 Jeremiah: O that my head were a spring of water
        and my eyes a fountain of tears;
    Then I could weep day and night for my poor people
        who have been slaughtered.
²     O that I had a place in the desert I could run to,
        a haven for travelers.
    Then I could leave my people,
        for they are all an adulterous and treacherous lot.

³ Eternal One: With tongues bent like bows they shoot their lies at one another.
        Truth does not win out in this land; deceit always seems to triumph.
    One evil leads to another because they don’t know who I am.
⁴     Let everyone be careful of his neighbor,
        and think twice before he trusts his brothers;
    For every brother is ready to cheat and deceive;
        every neighbor is prepared to lie when it suits him.
⁵     In this land of liars, friends have no misgivings about deceiving one another;
        no one even thinks to tell the truth.
    They’ve trained their tongues to utter lies;
        they wear themselves out with all their sinning.
⁶     Jeremiah, you live in a place where deception is assumed;
        as their lies pile up, they refuse to acknowledge Me.

Eternal One: Watch, I will refine this nation and put them to the test.
        What else can I do with My people?
⁸     Their tongues are like deadly arrows;
        they speak such lies;
    Each one leads his neighbor with kind words
        into a trap that was already set.
⁹     Should I not punish them for what they do?
        Should I not repay a nation that acts this way?

¹⁰ Jeremiah: I will weep bitterly for the mountains of my homeland
        and grieve for the death of her wild meadows.
    For they have become a silent wasteland
        where no one dares to travel.
    Pastures once filled with the lowing of cattle, now are empty and lifeless.
        All the animals have fled; even the birds have left the sky.

¹¹ Eternal One: I will leave Jerusalem in ruins;
        her rubble will be the haunt of jackals.
    I will wreak the same havoc on the cities of Judah;
        no person will be found there.

Eternal One: Think this over, and summon the mourners.
        Send for the women who will chant the dirge, that they may come.
¹⁸     Let them be quick about it: weep and wail,
        that our eyes may fill with tears that streak down our faces.
¹⁹     Listen to the voice of sorrow weeping from Zion herself:
        “We are ruined. All that remains for us is great shame.
    Now we must leave this land that was ours;
        they have torn down our houses.”

²⁰ Jeremiah: So listen now, women of Judah, to the word of the Eternal.
        Mark His words well.
    It is time to teach your daughters how to mourn,
        time to teach your neighbors the song of lament.
²¹     For death has found us all.
        It has crept in through our windows and slipped past our defenses.
    It has cut down our children in the streets,
        and our young men in the public squares. Death has found us all.
²²     Tell everyone what the Eternal has said:
        “The dead bodies of men will fall like dung on the open field.
    Corpses will lie on the ground like grain cut in the harvest;
        but on this day, there will be no one to gather and bury the dead.”