Refugee blues

       Say this city has ten million souls,
       Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes:
       Yet there's no place for us, my dear, yet there's no place for us.

       Once we had a country and we thought it fair,
       Look in the atlas and you'll find it there:
       We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.

       In the village churchyard there grows an old yew,
       Every spring it blossoms anew:
       Old passports can't do that, my dear, old passports can't do that.

       The consul banged the table and said,
       "If you've got no passport you're officially dead":
       But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive.

       Went to a committee; they offered me a chair;
       Asked me politely to return next year:
       But where shall we go to-day, my dear, but where shall we go to-day?

       Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said;
       "If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread":
       He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me.

       Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky;
       It was Hitler over Europe, saying, "They must die":
       O we were in his mind, my dear, O we were in his mind.

       Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin,
       Saw a door opened and a cat let in:
       But they weren't German Jews, my dear, but they weren't German Jews.

       Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay,
       Saw the fish swimming as if they were free:
       Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away.

       Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees;
       They had no politicians and sang at their ease:
       They weren't the human race, my dear, they weren't the human race.

       Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors,
       A thousand windows and a thousand doors:
       Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours.

       Stood on a great plain in the falling snow;
       Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro:
       Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.