Isaiah 42:14

הֶחֱשֵׁיתִי מֵעוֹלָם אַחֲרִישׁ אֶתְאַפָּק כַּיּוֹלֵדָה אֶפְעֶה אֶשֹּׁם וְאֶשְׁאַף יָחַד׃

14 I have been silent for a long time.
     I have kept still; I have restrained myself.
  Like a woman in labor, I will cry out;
     I will gasp and I will pant all together.

הֶחֱשֵׁיתִי מֵעוֹלָם I have been silent for a long time. הֶחֱשֵׁיתִי is the hifil perfect 1 sg of חָשָׁה, "be silent." Although some lexicons dub this a "late" word, David uses it in Psalm 39 and Solomon in Ecclesiastes 3:7. The idea of עוֹלָם here is just a long time, longer than the speaker (God) cares to remember. If God himself says something has been going on a long time, it has been a long time indeed. In fact, since the Lord said the words "Seed time and harvest..." to Noah, his patience has endured; his forbearance has been the law until the Last Day will dawn.

אַחֲרִישׁ אֶתְאַפָּק I have kept still; I have restrained myself. אַחֲרִישׁ, hifil imperfect of the stative verb חָרֵשׁ "be silent." Some lexicons rightly note that the hifil of this verb is almost always the silence of men, but this is an exception. אֶתְאַפָּק hithpael imperfect (1 sg) אָפַךְ "be strong, restrain oneself." The hithpael has a middle or reflexive force here (the form is in pause due to the atnach). The Lord has kept his temper and restrained himself despite the world's indifference to him.

כַּיּוֹלֵדָה Like a woman in labor, יּוֹלֵדָה is a qal participle, "one who is begetting, bearing a child (יָלַד)." The munah connects the participle to the verb, combining the construction into something like "I will cry out the way a woman in labor screams."

אֶפְעֶה I will cry out qal imperfect 1 sg פָּצָה, "groan, cry out." Zaqef sets this phrase apart from what follows. This form occurs four times: Job 20:16; Isaiah 30:6; 42:14 and 59:5.

אֶשֹּׁם I will gasp qal imperfect 1 sg נָשַׁם, "pant," especially the deep panting of a woman in childbirth. This form occurs only here, and the Mp note is a necessary safeguard against confusing this form with אָשָׁם "sin" or related verbal forms.

וְאֶשְׁאַף I will pant, qal waw-imperfect 1 sg שָׁעַף, "gasp" like a woman in childbirth. The two terms joined merka to tipha are probably a pair that women and midwives would recognize, but which doesn't happen to occur again in Scripture.

יָחַד All together. Actually, "all at the same time" is more the idea of the adverb יָחַד, "together, all together," Latin simul. At the end of a phrase it means "together," e.g. Gen. 13:6, "they were not able to stay together." TWOT points out that the LXX usually translates יָחַד with ὁμοθυμαδόν (e.g. Lam 2:8), but here it is ἅμα "together." The idea is that, like a woman in childbirth who yells, gasps and pants all at the same time (and suddenly), the Lord who has been so patient for so long is suddenly exploding into action. Now is the time; it is certainly going to take place. A long delay (as in a pregnancy) is now met with the moment of action and decision.

This is a bold comparison, like the one of the Lord like a drunk just waking up (Psalm 78:65).