The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-04-01
MUSIC OF SWEAT SHOP
ROsENFELD's POEM, WITH Flea.
NOR SMITHS MUSIC, sTIRS
CHICAGO
THE HOME OF JEWISH POETRY
Isaac ReingO1d, Who Works in n
Tailor Shop, Has WrestIed Sue
cessfully With the Po-
etic Muse.


apparently Chicago is becoming the
home of Jewish poetry, SO far as Ameri-
ca is concerned. Today she boasts of
two poets of wide reputation, who are
singing the songs of labor and poverty
and unrewardcd effort. One is Morris
Resented, who recently went there from
New York, and the other is Isaac Rein
gold, who has lived there for years.
Both speak from experience; both have
known the privations and the toll that
they so pathetically picture; both have
worked in sweat shops and both began
their literary labors amid the surround
ings that they describe. In fact, the first
poems of both were written while they
were earning their daily bread with the
shears and the needle, in that soul
destroying grind of which so much is
heard and so little is really known by
the average man or woman. Again
there is a similarity in the fact that the
genius of both was recognized by out
siders of discernment and opportunity
was given them to better their condition
and show what they could do.
Today Reingold still labors in a Chi
cago tailoring establishment, but under
more favorable conditions than hereto
fore and with the hope that he may be
able to give up the work later Many OF
his songs have been set to music and
published, and arrangements are now be-
ing made to translate them into English
and publish the collection in book form
Rosenfeld, however, has been able to
leave his bench, has supported himself
several years by his writings, and is now
associate editor of the Jewish Call, a
paper published from 213 West Twelfth
street, Chicago His family still lives i'll
New York. and he has a book shop there
at 202 West End avenue, to which he may
yet return. He is at present undecided
VI hnfr he will hon tn Toxxy VII
or take his family to Chicago.
OF these two Yiddish poets Resented
is deserving of first attention. There
may be as much of merit in the work of
Reingold, but circumstances conspired to
bring Kosenfeld more prominently into
public notice. His poem entitled '"rhe
Sweat Shop created a verjtable sensa-
ticn when set to music by Miss Eleanor
Smith and sung before the Chicago Con-
sumers' league at Hull house short
time ago, and the interest thus aroused
has at least indirectly served to call at
tention to the other poet who is singing
in the same strain. 1t may be said in
passing that the song as sung ON that
occasion was incomplete, but it certainly
served it's purpose. Miss Smith, who is
Chicago music teacher, is still working
on the music, and refuses to give it out
for publication until it has been polished
up to her satisfaction
80 far as the music is concerned she
says, the song was not finished when it
was heard at Hull house. / have done a
good deal Of work on it since them
The words, however, have undergone
no changes They were translated from
the original Yiddish by Prof ]. W. Linn.
of the University of Chicago, and III
view of the fame they have brought their
author the entire poem can hardly fail to
be of interest. 1t is as follows:
The roaring of the wheels has filed my
ears,
The clashing and the clamor shut me
in:
Myself, my soul, in chaos disappears.
1 cannot think OR feel amid the din.
Toiling and toiling and toiling-endless
toll.
For whom? For what? Why should
the work be done?
do not ask. or know. only toll.
I work until the day and night are one.
The clock above me ticks away the day.
Its hands are spinning, spinning, like
the wheels.
It cannot sleep or for a moment stay,
1t is a thing like me- and does not feel
1t throbs as though my heart were beat
ing there
A heart? My heart? I know not what
it means
The clock ticks, and below I strive and
And SO we lose the hour. We are ma
chimes.
Noon calls a truce, an ending to the
sound
AS if a battle had one moment stayed
A bloody field! The dead lie all around;
Their wounds cry out until 1 grow
It comes-the signal! See, the dead men
rise,
They fight again, amid the roar they
Blindly, and knowing not for whom. or
why
They fight, they fall, they sink into the
night.
1t was first sung before the Arts and
Handicrafts association, and attracted so
much attention there that the Consumers
league-an organization that aims to bet
ter the conditions of employees generally
expressed desire to hear it. AS be-
fore stated, the finishing touches had not
been put to the music, but it made a dis
tinct hit, nevertheless. That was FEB. Is,
and since then the poem has become
sort of anthem of the workers in the
slums. It far more typical of existing
conditions than 1.-THE Man With the Hoe
and it bids fair to have far-reaching eff
feet
And the man who wrote this song work
ed in the sweat shops of England and
America for eighteen or twenty years.
being finally discovered in literary sense
by a Harvard professor. RoSenfeld IS
the son of a poor fisherman, and was
born in Russian Poland in 1862. Such
Scanty education as he received in his
youth he secured there, but his whole
life has been one continuous effort to i'm
prove mentally as well as in a worldly
way. He learned the diamond cutting
trade in Amsterdam, when he finally sue
ceeded in getting away from his birth
place, and then found employment as
tailor in London. From there he came to
New York, where he remained until in