JEWISH SUFFERING
BREAK forth in lamentation,
My agonizing song,
That like a lava-torrent
Has boiled within me long.
My song shall thrill each hearer,
And none so deaf but hears,
For the burden of my ditty
Is the pain of a thousand years.
It melts both gentle and simple,
Even hearts of stone are riven—
Sets women and flowers weeping;
They weep, the stars of heaven.
And all these tears are flowing
By channels still and wide,
Homeward they are all flowing
To meet in Jordan’s tide.
H. HEINE, 1824.