Rhyming Isaiah, Chapter 14

Rhyming Isaiah, Chapter 14

On Jacob will the LORD, compassion, have,
and, his choice, Is’rael, he will make, again.
He will resettle them in their own land;
and, come to join them there, will, aliens,
to Jacob’s people they’ll, themselves, attach.
Her homeland, to, the nations will escort
her, Israel, and she will, them, take o’er,
possessing them as male and female slaves
in the LORD’s land; her captors, she will take
them captive, and she will, in the same way,
those who oppressed her, lord it over them.

The LORD relieves, that day, upon, is when,
your pain and turmoil, the hard service with
which you were made to serve, you’ll take up this:
a taunt, the king of Babylon against:

See, the oppressor, still, become, how has!
It’s ceased, it’s stilled, his raging arrogance!
The LORD has broken off the wicked’s staff,
the rod that wicked tyrants have in hand,
that downward struck the people in their wrath
with blows unceasing, that, in anger, ruled,
the nations endlessly, they’d persecute.
The whole earth is both quiet and at rest;
to singing, they break forth. The cypresses
exalt o’er you, of Lebanon, the trees,
its cedars, over you, rejoicingly.
“Since you have been laid low,” they say aloud,
“no woodsmen ever comes to chop us down.”
It’s Sheol ‘neath that’s upwards stirred to meet
you when you come; it’s roused the shades to greet
you, all of them who once the earth did lead;
it raises all them from their thronely seats,
all who were, of the many nations, kings.
These words are how all of them will, you, greet:

“You also have become as weak as we!
Like us, you are positioned sim’larly!”
Brought down to Sheol, all your pride and pomp,
as well cast there, the soundings of your harps;
your mattress, maggots, you, they’re underneath,
and worms, a blanket for your covering.

How is it you, from heaven, fallen, are,
the Son of Dawn, O you, the Morning Star!
How did you come to be thrown to the ground,
you conqueror of nations are cut down!
Within your heart you said, “I will ascend
to heaven; there is where my throne I’ll set,
above the stars of God, I’ll take my seat;
up to the mountains high where gods will meet,
in the far recess of the northern reach.
Up to their tops, the clouds, ascend, I will.
like the Most High, how I will make myself.”
Instead you, down to Sheol, will be brought,
you’ll go to the recesses of the Pit!
When they see you, you, they will scrutinize
and, what you have become, they’ll analyze:
“Is this the man who, tremble, the earth, made,
and he the one who made the kingdoms shake,
who, like a desert, turned the world into
and all its cities, them, he overthrew,
and never let his prisoners go home?”
All other kings of nations, all of them
lie hon’rably, each one in his own tomb,
but you, unburied, out, where you’ve been thrown,
you’re likened to some loathsome carrion,
a carcass that’s been trampled underfoot.
You’re covered by the dead the sword has pierced,
who have been cast down into the abyss.
You won’t, with them, in burial, be joined,
because your land is what you have destroyed,
and all your people, those, the ones you killed.

May the descendants of such evildo’ers
ne’er more be named! Because their fathers’ guilt,
the slaughter of the sons should be prepared.
Rise to possess the earth, let them not e’er,
or, with their cities, cover the world o’er.

Declares the Lord of Hosts, “‘Gainst them I’ll rise
and off from Babylon I will excise
whatever that would in that place remain,
her offspring, her posterity, her name,”
declares the LORD. “It, into, I shall make
a haunt for hedgehogs and a marshland waste.
It’s with destruction’s broom I’ll sweep that place,”
the LORD of Hosts, this is the word he says.

The LORD of Hosts has sworn, “As I’ve designed
so shall it be; and just as I have planned,
so my intention, what will come to pass.
In my land, I’ll break the Assyrian.
Upon my mountains, I will trample him.
Removed, the yoke, from off of them will lift,
his burden will, from off their shoulders, slip.
This is the plan prepared for the whole world,
and this, the hand stretched, all the nations, o’er.
For this, the LORD of Hosts himself has planned
and who will, it, annul? Outstretched his hand,
and who is powerful to turn it back?”

King Ahaz died, it was in that same year,
this oracle from God to Is’rael’s ears:

All of you Philistines, do not rejoice,
‘cause broken’s now the rod that, you, chastised;
a viper shall be born of serpent stock,
its offspring is a dragon that can fly.
The firstborn of the poor will graze their flocks,
the destitute will, downwards, safely lie,
but, die of famine, I’ll, your offspring, make,
and all your remnant, even them, I’ll slay.

You gate, wail! Howl, you city! Melt away,
all of you Philistines! A cloud of smoke
comes from the north, and there’s not in its ranks
a straggler found. What answer, be giv’n, shall,
unto the envoys of, the nations, all?

“It’s Zion that the LORD established firm,
and, will his people, those afflicted, who’re,
a refuge, what it is they find in her.”