Zhikhlinski was born in Gombin, Poland. Her father was a tanner. He went to America for the third time in 1924 and died in Chicago in 1928. Her religious mother did not want to emigrate to a land where her children would work on Sabbath. Raisl’s mother and her children and grandchildren were gassed in Chelmno. Raisl studied with private teachers in a Polish folkshul. In 1935 she worked in an orphanage in Vlotslavek. During WWII she left Warsaw and with her husband, an MD, fled to Russia. In 1947 they went back to Poland and then Lodz. She lived in Paris, 1948 to 1951 and since 1951 in America where she worked in a factory then finished High School and City College in New York. She was published in “Haynt” and “Moment” among other journals. Her first book Lider, (“Poems) was also published by the Yiddish Pen Club in 1936 in Warsaw, and was published widely after coming to Canada. She also produced seven books in Yiddish. A collection of her poems, God Hid His Face was published in 1997. It consists of her Yiddish poems translated to English.