The Song Remains – דאָס ליד איז געבליבן

The Song Remains

People of the Warsaw Ghetto merged with a map of the Nazi occupation of Poland

דאָס ליד איז געבליבן

Welcome to our collection of Yiddish poems with English translations from Nazi German occupied Poland. We’ll be publishing one new poem per week into 2027, so be sure to subscribe to get free weekly updates.

  • Miryem (Miriam) Ulinover

    Oo-hoo-hoo wind in the chimney
    I hear a sadness time
    I hear a black, dark dead long note
    The chimney sweeper’s own love song

    Did not know of joy to sing
    did not know except one thing
    Black are hands and black the face
    blackened life is in this place

    Where eyes can hardly move up there
    black are chimney sweepers hands and hair
    never smoked when I was with her
    The flame of love was grand

    How I loved this lovely maiden
    loved her day and night
    She was pure and lovely
    and the flame burned bright

    Oh the wind was frightening
    sad and hurting from his threat
    she sought safety by the fire
    and she sits there yet…

    Oo-hoo-hoo how wind did rumble
    Oo-hoo-hoo blowing with alarm
    She, collapsed, sits by the fire
    trying to stay warm…

    (more…)

  • Mordche (Mordechai) Gebirtig

    Hey little lambs come here faster
    I’ll welcome you with a little song
    A shepherd began singing
    and a maiden joined him along

    Listen little lambs to hear the story
    of his happiness long ago
    There are no more sheep to be heard
    He longs for the maiden’s loving words

    Hey little lambs hear the story’s end
    how they wander blindly far and wide
    Deep in the river dwells the shepherd
    beside the river mourns his bride

    (more…)

  • H Veber

    On an evening twilight corner
    flames arise with thousand eyes
    and the sky blue and blueness
    the wandering Romani wildness
    the moon

    (more…)

  • Hersh Veber (1904-1943) was born in Jasło (Yaslo). He had a religious upbringing, and later studied mathematics at Kraków University. He published his first poem in 1930, and continued to publish poems in a number of journals and periodicals. During the Nazi occupation he was confined in the Janów ghetto. He was murdered in Drohobycz along with other Jews from neighbouring ghettos.

    (more…)

  • Y L Kohn

    My “shul” is my poor home
    the yard, the streets of the city;
    the streets surrounding were like stone tablets
    like stone tablets marked with blood

    (more…)

  • Miryem (Miriam) Ulinover

    Good night to you my little village
    and a good forever…
    Does a leaf rustle on the tree?
    Or does sorrow sing everywhere?

    (more…)

  • Motl Kozlovski

    Sirens cut the air in two
    a late whore hurries down a side street
    weary bodies wake from here to China
    and homeless streetcars ring in the day

    So how, in what way can I praise you
    sadness lives long in your street miles
    clouds hang gray over your red gates
    from chimneys smoking up the sky

    Seldom a ray sneaks in from somewhere
    people run, rushing as if chasing someone
    pale women – sick birds lurk on side streets
    and days of wrath arrive in convoy

    Łódź you’re called the Polish Manchester
    you brag about your factory streets
    while in your cellars and your attics
    your sons and daughters choke
    with worry and defeat

    (more…)

  • Motl Kozlovski (1910-1944?) was born in Przysucha (Pshiskhe). He had a traditional education, and worked as a tailor. He published poems in a number of journals. He was deported from the Łódź ghetto, and died in Auschwitz.

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  • Khayim Semiatitski (Chaim Semiatitsky)

    Don’t cry child
    autumn will not live long in our land
    he is like a poor man who is blind
    the wind leads him by his hand
    Give the autumn like a good coin away
    to sorrow
    He will cry for joy
    until he comes to the frosted wintry door
    The summer has bright eyes
    by day the sun and by night the moon
    The winter – a beautiful faced old man
    with a white beard spread out over his knees
    So give the Autumn a gift of your sadness

    (more…)

  • Khayim Semiatitski (1908-1943) was born in Tykocin into a rabbinic family, and was ordained as a rabbi, but never assumed an official position. He moved to Warsaw, and began to write poetry, poems, stories, and critical reviews which were published in a number of newspapers and literary journals.

    His book Tropns Toy (Dewdrops) won the Y L Peretz award of the PEN club of Yiddish writers in Warsaw. He believed that the task of the artist is to polish the Creator’s work.

    When the Nazis occupied Warsaw, he fled to Białystok, and later to Vilnius. He was murdered during the liquidation of the Vilna Ghetto in September 1943.

    (more…)