Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün

Geçer mi āhumuñ tīri irişdükçe feleklerden
Ṣorarsañ bilesin daḫı feleklerde meleklerden
Benümçün kimse ḳalmadı niyāz itmeye ḳapuñda
Dirīġā kim ḳabūl olmaz biri bunca dileklerden
Ne olur māl-ı dünyāvī vireydüm cānı şükrāne
Ṭolaşsa boynuma görsem biri sīmīn bileklerden
Seḥer tāvus idüp cilve irişmez zülf-i zībāña
Cehāletden ider nāle döger miskīn bileklerden
Ġubār olup tozum her dem tozarsa n'ola bād ile
Baña çoḳ cevr idüp dil-ber geçürmişdür eleklerden
Göricek ḳadd-i bālāñı bu iki merdüm-i çeşmüm
Ṣaçarlar dürr ile la‘li yoluña mā-meleklerden
Gehī vaṣl ü gehī fürḳat zihī taḳdīr-i Rabbānī
Şikāyet eyleme ‘Adlī kevākibden feleklerden

In English

1. When the arrow of my sigh reaches the heavens, does it pierce through them? If you ask, you will learn this from the angels in the heavens too.

2. No one is left to plead on my behalf at your door; alas, not even one of so many wishes is granted.

3. What is worldly wealth; if one of those silver wrists (the arm of a beauty with wrists white as silver) were to wind around my neck, I would give my soul in thanks.

4. At dawn, though the peacock struts and displays its beauty, it cannot reach your lovely hair; out of ignorance it moans, and the poor creature beats itself by the wrists. The last part of the second line is not entirely clear; "dögmek" has been understood here as beating oneself, as in mourning.

5. Is it any wonder if I turn to dust and am blown about by the wind at every moment; the beloved, with much cruelty, has passed me through sieves.

6. On seeing the loftiness of your stature, these two pupils of my eyes scatter pearls and rubies on your path from all they possess (my eyes shed white and bloody tears on your path).

7. Now union, now separation: how fine is the divine decree. Adlî, do not complain of the stars and the heavens.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal (gazel) has seven couplets and is written in the hezec metre "mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün". The redif (refrain word) is the suffix "-lerden" (from the ...s); the rhyme rests on the sound "-ek": felek, melek, dilek, bilek, elek, mâ-melek. Two of the rhyme words are repeated: "bileklerden" occurs in couplets 3 and 4, and "feleklerden" in both the opening and the closing couplet. The ghazal is a short love poem whose opening couplet rhymes within itself and whose other couplets rhyme with it in their second lines. It stands as no. 109 in Bayram's edition and is found in all five manuscripts (OR, T, M1, M2, İBB); however, couplet 4 is missing in İBB, and in OR the word "tâvus" of this couplet is missing. The other variants that affect the meaning are these: in couplet 1, some manuscripts read "geçürdüm" (I passed it through) for "geçer mi", and T, M1 and M2 read "tîrin" for "tîri"; in couplet 7, T, M1 and M2 read "gehî" for "zihî". To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal opens with the sky and closes with the sky. In the opening couplet the lover's sigh is an arrow; the question is asked whether it reaches the heavens and pierces through them, and the answer is known to the angels, the dwellers of the heavens. The sigh rising to the sky is one of the most common images of classical poetry. The reading "geçürdüm" in the manuscripts turns the question into a claim: the lover has driven the arrow of his sigh through the heavens. There is congruence of images (tenasüp) among the words "tîr" (arrow), "felek" (heaven) and "melek" (angel), and a likeness of sound between "felek" and "melek".

In the closing couplet, however, the same heavens cease to be an object of complaint. In classical poetry the lover usually blames his misfortune on the stars and the heavens; Adlî instead reminds himself that union and separation are both God's decree and tells himself not to complain. The contrast between the sigh rising to the sky in the opening couplet and the submission in the closing couplet ties the two ends of the ghazal together. There is a contrast between "vasl" (union) and "fürkat" (separation); the reading "gehî" in T, M1 and M2 sharpens this contrast by repeating "now... now..." three times.

The couplets in between deal with the lover's loneliness and helplessness. In the second couplet no one is left to intercede for the lover at the beloved's door, and no wish is granted. In the third couplet a wrist white as silver winding around the neck is found worth giving up the soul in thanks; "sîmîn", in its dictionary sense, means made of silver, silver-like, and in classical poetry it is used for the white skin of the beauty. In the fourth couplet the peacock, though it struts with its coloured feathers, cannot reach the beloved's hair and moans because of it. The bird's beauty falling short of the beloved's is a common way of exalting the beloved in classical poetry.

In the fifth couplet the words "gubâr" (dust), "toz" (dust) and "bâd" (wind) form a cluster, and the couplet rests on the idiom "to pass through a sieve". In its dictionary sense the idiom means to test someone thoroughly, to pick them apart; here the lover's being sifted by the beloved's cruelty until he turns to dust uses the figurative and the literal meaning together. In the sixth couplet "merdüm-i çeşm" is the pupil of the eye; "merdüm", in its dictionary sense, means both a person and the pupil of the eye. The pupils scatter pearls and rubies like people who scatter their wealth on the beloved's path: the pearl is the white tear, the ruby the bloody tear. "Mâ-melek", in its dictionary sense, means everything a person owns.

Bibliography

  • Yavuz Bayram (ed.), Adlî Dîvânı (Dîvân-ı Sultân Bâyezîd-i Sânî), Ankara: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yay., 2018, p. 147, poem no. 109 (manuscript variants in the footnote on the same page). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr