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Dona Dona Dona

  • Writer: Debra
    Debra
  • 20 hours ago
  • 1 min read

4 July 2025


Dona Dona Dona

by Teddi Schwartz, Sholom Secunda, Arthur S. Kevess, and Aaron Zeitlin


On a wagon bound for market

There’s a calf with a mournful eye.

 

High above him,

There’s a swallow

 

Winging swiftly through the sky.

 

How the winds are laughing!

 

They laugh with all their might.

 

Laugh and laugh

the whole day through

and half the summer’s night.

 

Dona, dona, dona,

dona,

dona, dona dona don. . . .


Dona, dona, dona,

dona,

dona, dona, dona don. . . .

 

“Stop complaining,” said the farmer,

Who told you all calves are free?

 

Why don’t you have wings to fly with,

Like the swallow

So proud and free?”

 

How the winds are laughing!

 

They laugh with all their might.

 

Laugh and laugh

the whole day through

and half the summer’s night.

 

Dona, dona, dona,

dona,


dona, dona, dona don. . . .

Dona, dona, dona,

dona,

 

dona, dona, dona don . . . .

 

Calves are easily bound

and slaughtered,

 

Never knowing the reason why.

 

But whoever treasures freedom,

 

Like the swallow


Has learned to fly.

 

How the winds are laughing!

 

They laugh with all their might.

 

Laugh and laugh

the whole day through

and half the summer’s night.

 

Dona, dona, dona,

dona,

 

dona, dona, dona don. . . .

 

Dona, dona, dona,

dona,

 

dona, dona, dona don. . . .

© 2024 by Debra Milligan

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