Like the prophets, zealous about Hashem* 

He was zealous about the verb, the adjective, 

  and the noun.

And at midnight, oil-lamp in his window,

He would write in his dictionary stacks

  and stacks of pretty words, words

  which fly, which roll from the tongue.

Eliezer, when will you lie down to sleep

You're practically bent over.**

And Hebrew, which has waited 2,000 years

Will still be waiting for you at dawn.

Eliezer Ben Yehuda,

An amusing Jew.

Words, words, words

He invented with his feverish brain.

If Hebrew has slept for 2,000 years, nu, so what?

Come, let's wake it up, and invent "initiative" (yozma), clothes-iron (mag-hetz), bomb (p'tzatza),
furniture (rihut).

With feather tip, in fluid writing,

He wrote k'ruvit (cauliflower), he wrote g'lida (ice cream);
he wrote all of the Ben Yehuda

  Dictionary.

And he went on creating words,

And his fast quill didn't rest,

And the language grew

And didn't recognize itself in the morning.

  Eliezer Ben Yehuda ...

And when a son was born to him, he said:

This firstborn I will call Ben Yehuda, Itamar

Who from infancy to withering

From the day of his entering the covenant

  (brit-milah) until his death

Will have a covenant, with Hebrew***

And will fight to wipe out foreign language.

Itamar - truly became a man,

Tall, handsome and well-spoken,

And the language he spoke was Hebrew.

Itamar Ben-Avi****

Whose father was a prophet,

A man after my own heart.

  Eliezer Ben Yehuda ...