If thieves came to you, if plunderers by night— how you have been destroyed!— would they not steal only enough for themselves? If grape gatherers came to you, would they not leave gleanings?
Gleanings will be left in it, as when an olive tree is beaten— two or three berries in the top of the highest bough, four or five on the branches of a fruit tree, says the Lord God of Israel.
How lonely sits the city that was full of people! How like a widow has she become, she that was great among the nations! She that was a princess among the cities has become a vassal.
Woe is me! For I have become as when the summer fruit has been gathered, as when the vintage has been gleaned: there is no cluster to eat, no first-ripe fig which my soul desires.
This is the exultant city that dwelt secure, that said to herself, “I am and there is none else.” What a desolation she has become, a lair for wild beasts! Every one who passes by her hisses and shakes his fist.