My Zayde

Moshe Yess
Megama

My Zayde lived with us in my parents’ home,
He used to laugh, he put me on his knee.
He spoke about his life in Poland,
He spoke, but with a bitter memory.

He spoke about the soldiers who would beat him;
They laughed at him, they tore his long black coat.
And he spoke about a synagogue that they burned down,
And the crying that was heard beneath the smoke.

Chorus:
But Zayde made us laugh,
Zayde made us sing,
And Zayde made a kiddush Friday night;
And Zayde, oh, my Zayde,
How I loved him so,
And Zayde used to teach me wrong from right.

His eyes lit up when he would teach me Torah,
He taught me every line so carefully.
He spoke about our slavery in Egypt,
And how G-d took us out to make us free.

But winter went by,
Summer came along,
I went to camp to run and play.
And when I came back home,
They said, “Zayde’s gone,”
And all his books were packed and stored away.

I don’t know how or why it came to be,
It happened slowly over many years,
We just stopped being Jewish
like my Zayde was,
And no one cared enough to shed a tear.

Chorus

But many winters went by,
And many summers came along,
And now my children sit in front of me.
And who will be the Zayde of my children,
Who will be their Zayde, if not me?

Who will be the Zaydes of our children,
Who will be their Zaydes, if not we?