first person, the interruption at v. 17 is hardly intrusive. It shows that the first speaker is still around and now comes back in the same vein. That this is the same voice as in vv. 1–11 is shown by the identical subject matter, viz Jerusalem and her plight, and the similarity of language (cf. v. 2, v. 8 and v. 10). Finally, the personified Jerusalem is depicted in v. 2 as weeping copiously, without a comforter, and v. 16 appears to supply confirmation of this, when the city says: ‘This is why