101With all my heart I am weary of my life,
so I will express my complaint freely.
I will speak from the bitterness of my heart.
2I will say this to God: Do not condemn me.
Tell me why you are pressing charges against me.
3Is it good that you are oppressing me,
that you are rejecting what your hands have made,
at the same time that you favor the plans of the wicked?
4Do you have eyes made of flesh?
Do you see things the way a man does?
5Are your days like a man's days?
Are your years like the life span of a human?
6You do, in fact, investigate guilt,
and you do search carefully for sin.
7Although you know that I am not guilty,
there is no one who can rescue me from your hand.
8Your hands shaped me and made me,
but now you swallow me up completely.
9Please remember that it was you who shaped me like a clay pot.
Will you now return me to the dust?
10Aren't you the one who poured me out like milk,
who thickened me like a curd of cheese?
11You clothed me with skin and flesh.
You wove me together with bones and tendons.
12You provided me with life and mercy,
and your watchful care has guarded my spirit.
13You hid these things in your heart,
but I know that this is what you had in mind:
14If I sinned and you were watching me,
you would not acquit me of my guilt.
15If I was wicked, I would be cursed!
But even if I was righteous, I could not lift up my head,
because I am filled with shame and aware[] of my misery. 16If I lift myself up,[] you hunt me down like a lion. You turn and display amazing power against me.
17You produce new witnesses to oppose me,
and you become more irritated with me.
You attack me with reinforcements.
18Why, then, did you bring me out from the womb?
I wish I had died. Then no eye would have seen me.
19I wish I had been like someone who never lived.
Then I would have been carried from the womb to the tomb.
20Don't I have only a few days?
Stop! Leave me alone, so that I can be happy for a short time,
21before I walk into the land of darkness
and into the shadow of death, never to return,
22into the land of gloom, as dark as the shadow of death,
into the land of chaos, where even light is darkness.