Rhyming Isaiah, Chapter 33

Rhyming Isaiah, Chapter 33

Woe, you destroyer, who’s not been destroyed,

you traitor who has never been betrayed!

Whenever, to destroy, that time, you cease,

it’s then when you, yourself, destroyed, will be,

and when it is that you no more betray,

then you will be betrayed that very day.

O LORD, be gracious to us; how we wait

for you.  Please, every morning be our arm,

and our salvation when our troubles come.

At tumult’s sound is when the peoples fled;

the nations scatter when you upward stand.

They strip like locusts, spoil, they gather in,

like locusts swarm, how they, on them, descend.

The LORD’s exalted, he on high who dwells;

with righteousness and justice he has filled

up Zion, of your times, how he will be

to you, the source of your stability,

abundance of salvation, knowledge, pure,

and wisdom, how it’s Zion’s treasure sure,

the source of wisdom: of the LORD, the fear.

Now listen how they cry out in the streets,

the valiant, and envoys, those of peace,

it’s bitterly the way they’re said to weep.

The highways are deserted, how they’ve quit

the road, the travelers. The covenants

have all been broken and the treaties’ terms

are disregarded.  All the country mourns,

and languishes, the land; how Lebanon,

with shame, it withers. Sharon has become

just like a wasteland; Carmel and Bashan

have, from their leaves, completely been stripped down.

“Now,” says the LORD, “the time when, rise, I will.

Now I shall rise and upwards draw myself.

Conceive, you, chaff, and stubble, you bring forth;

a fire that will consume you is your breath.

The peoples will be burned as if to lime,

like thorns cut down, they’re burned up in the fire.”

Hear, you who are, away, far, what I’ve done,

and you who are nearby, acknowledgment

give to my might.  The sinners are afraid,

in Zion; trembling has, the godless, seized:

“Who ‘mongst us here can live with, that devours,

the fire? Who can, the everlasting fire

survive?” The one who acts with righteousness

and speaks uprightly, those who are oppressed,

the gain derived from them, what they despise,

it’s those who always wave away the bribe

instead of taking it.  Who stopped their ears

when news of bloodshed, spoken, is, them, near,

and shut their eyes, on evil, they ne’er peer,

it’s on the heights, the place where they will live;

their fortress is a stronghold in the cliffs;

their food will be supplied and it’s assured,

their water source will never be disturbed.

Your eyes will see the king, his beauty, in,

that stretches far away, they’ll see a land.

You’ll call to mind the thing that you once feared:

“Where is the one who counted and who weighed

the tribute?  Where’s the one, the count, he made,

of all the treasure, what we had to pay?”

The people who you will no longer see,

the ones who always, insolent, will be,

the ones who you can’t understand their speech,

their language sounds like senseless stammering.

On Zion, look, the city of our feasts!

Upon Jerusalem, let your eyes rest,

a home that is secure, just like a tent,

immovable, whose pegs will ne’er relent,

whose ropes are never severed nor are split.

But there, the LORD, in majesty will be

for us a place of rivers, broad, and streams

where no majestic galley ship can pass,

no rowing ships with sails spread from their masts.

For how the LORD is, o’er his people, judge,

the LORD, he is our king, and he’ll save us,

the LORD is our lawgiver from above.

It’s obvious your rigging’s hanging loose,

and in its place, firm, it can’t hold the mast,

or sails, against the wind’s pull, hold them fast.

Then, of the spoil, the blind will have their share,

and even will the lame, some pillage, bear.

Nobody living there, say, ever will,

“I’m sick”; the people, in that place, who dwell,

they’ll be forgiven, all their sins and guilt.