Why does Jeremiah call out to the Lord to hear him and to listen to the voice of his adversaries?

The prose in Jeremiah 18:18 has set the scene for the passage of poetry in Jeremiah 18:19–23, as Jeremiah cries out to the Lord in another of his confessions. He calls on the Lord to hear. The same Hebrew root qasab that is used in Jeremiah 18:18 (pay attention) is used here.¹ His adversaries say they will not listen to Jeremiah’s words (Jeremiah 18:18), and so he calls on the Lord to listen to what they are saying. It is after all the Lord’s word that they refuse to listen to.