Protect me as you would protect the pupil of your eye! ¹  Hide me in the shadow of your wings! ² 

Yet you have battered us, leaving us a heap of ruins overrun by wild dogs; ¹  you have covered us with darkness. ² 

For you are my deliverer; ¹  under your wings ²  I rejoice.

As for you, the one who lives ²  in the shelter of the sovereign One, ³  and resides in the protective shadow ⁴  of the mighty king ⁵  –

My days are coming to an end, ¹  and I am withered like grass.

I am fading away like a shadow at the end of the day; ¹  I am shaken off like a locust.

But they do not realize ¹  that the dead ²  are there, that her guests are in the depths of the grave. ³ 

So God sent ¹  a worm at dawn the next day, and it attacked the little plant so that it dried up.

to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, ¹  to guide our feet into the way ²  of peace.”

¹ Your dead will come back to life; your corpses will rise up. Wake up and shout joyfully, you who live in the ground! ²  For you will grow like plants drenched with the morning dew, ³  and the earth will bring forth its dead spirits. ⁴ 

Look, I will make the shadow go back ten steps on the stairs of Ahaz.” ¹  And then the shadow went back ten steps. ² 

whose foliage was attractive and its fruit plentiful, and from which there was food available for all, under whose branches wild animals ¹  used to live, and in whose branches birds of the sky used to nest –

Hezekiah answered, “It is easy for the shadow to lengthen ten steps, but not for it ¹  to go back ten steps.”

Isaiah the prophet called out to the Lord, and the Lord ¹  made the shadow go back ten steps on the stairs of Ahaz. ² 

For we are resident foreigners and nomads in your presence, like all our ancestors; ¹  our days are like a shadow on the earth, without security. ² 

Let darkness and the deepest shadow ¹  claim it; ²  let a cloud settle on it; let whatever blackens the day ³  terrify it!

Even when I must walk through the darkest valley, I fear no danger, for you are with me; your rod and your staff reassure me. ¹ 

How precious ¹  is your loyal love, O God! The human race finds shelter under your wings. ² 

But it will not go well with the wicked, nor will they ¹  prolong their ²  days like a shadow, ³  because they ⁴  do not stand in fear ⁵  before God.

when those who keep watch over the house ¹  begin to tremble, ²  and the virile men begin to stoop over, ³  and the grinders ⁴  begin to cease because they grow few, and those who look through the windows grow dim, ⁵