My Heart Is In the East

By Yehuda Halevi

(c. 1141)

My heart is in the east, and I in the uttermost west--

How can I find savour in food? How shall it be sweet to me?

How shall I render my vows and my bonds, while yet

Zion lieth beneath the fetter of Edom, and I in Arab chains?

A light thing would it seem to me to leave all the good things of Spain --

Seeing how precious in mine eyes to behold the dust of the desolate sanctuary.

Source: Translated from the Hebrew by Nina Salaman, 1924 This edition published in 1924 by Jewish Publication Society of America, Essential Texts of Zionism