Jeremiah

²⁶I saw, and behold, the fruitful field was a wilderness, and all its cities were broken down at the presence of the Lord, before his fierce anger. ²⁷For the Lord says, “The whole land will be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end. ²⁸For this the earth will mourn, and the heavens above be black; because I have spoken it. I have planned it, and I have not repented, neither will I turn back from it.” ²⁹Every city flees for the noise of the horsemen and archers. They go into the thickets, and climb up on the rocks. Every city is forsaken, and not a man dwells therein. ³⁰You, when you are made desolate, what will you do? Though you clothe yourself with scarlet, though you deck yourself with ornaments of gold, though you enlarge your eyes with makeup, you make yourself beautiful in vain. Your lovers despise you. They seek your life. ³¹For I have heard a voice as of a woman in travail, the anguish as of her who gives birth to her first child, the voice of the daughter of Zion, who gasps for breath, who spreads her hands, saying, “Woe is me now! For my soul faints before the murderers.”