Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Güneş yüzin seḥāb örter benüm dūd-ı siyāhumdan
Kebāb olmış ciger būyı gelür her demde āhumdan
Ḫaṭāsın ḳullaruñ şehler göricek ‘afv ider līkin
Benüm ‘özrümi ol dil-ber görür artuḳ günāhumdan
Bulur biñ ḳul azād itmek s̱evābın raḥm iden dilden
Beni yād eylemek bir dem gelürse pādşāhumdan
Sikender rāh-ı ẓulmetde bulurdı āb-ı ḥayvānı
İreydi ẕerrece pertev benüm gün yüzli māhumdan
Göñülde çeşm-i maḫmūruñ ḫayāliyle ölürsem ben
Bitiser nergis-i şehlā tenüm üzre giyāhumdan
Günehdür diyü ṭa‘n itme çün itdük ḳaşların ḳıble
Yüzüm dördürmezem zāhid ḳo nuṣḥı secdegāhumdan
Belā vü derdimiş iy dil ezelden ‘Adli'ye ḳısmet
Fiġān u nāleden geç kim budur taḳdīr İlāhumdan

In English

1. From my black smoke (the smoke of my sighs) a cloud veils the face of the sun; at every moment the smell of a roasted liver rises from my sighs.

2. When kings see the faults of their servants they forgive them; but that beauty judges my apology greater than my sin. In the reading of OR and İBB the second half becomes a question: why does that beauty judge my apology greater than my sin.

3. If, for a single moment, the thought of me should come from the heart of my sovereign (the beloved), that merciful heart would earn the reward of freeing a thousand slaves.

4. Had even a speck of light reached Alexander from my sun-faced moon (my beloved), he would have found the water of life on the road of darkness.

5. If I die in my heart with the image of your languid eye, a şehlâ (hazel, languishing) narcissus will grow from the grass upon my body (narcissi like the beloved's eye will bloom on my grave).

6. Ascetic, do not reproach me saying "it is a sin", for we have taken his eyebrows as our qibla (the direction of prayer). Leave your counsel; I will not turn my face from my place of prostration.

7. O heart, affliction and pain were Adlî's lot from pre-eternity; give up wailing and moaning, for this is the decree of my God.

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 suffixes "-umdan" (from my ...); the rhyme rests on the sound "-âh": siyâh, âh, günâh, pâdşâh, mâh, giyâh, secdegâh, İlâh. It is a ghazal whose opening couplet rhymes within itself and whose other couplets rhyme with it in their second lines. It stands as no. 113 in Bayram's edition and is found in the manuscripts OR, M1, M2 and İBB; it is absent from T. The variants that affect the meaning are these: in couplet 2, OR and İBB read "niçün" (why) for "lîkin" (but); in couplet 4, OR and İBB read "tâb-ı zulmet" (the depth of darkness) for "râh-ı zulmet" (the road of darkness); in couplet 6, OR, M1 and İBB have "kaşlaruñ" (your eyebrows) for "kaşların" (his eyebrows). To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet presents the lover's sigh as the smoke of a fire. The sigh is a smoke so thick that it becomes a cloud and veils the sun, and the smell of the liver burning within spills out with this smoke. There is congruence of images (tenasüp) among the words "dûd" (smoke), "kebâb", "bûy" (smell) and "âh" (sigh). The link between the face of the sun and the face of the beloved becomes explicit in the fourth couplet, where the beloved is a "sun-faced moon".

The second and third couplets are built on the relationship of king and servant. Kings forgive the faults of their servants; the beloved, however, counts even the lover's apology heavier than a sin. In the third couplet the beloved is addressed directly as "pâdşâhum" (my sovereign), and the lover takes the position of the beloved's slave. The claim that remembering him for a moment would earn as much reward as freeing a thousand slaves rests on the freeing of slaves being counted a religious merit. Given that the poem was written by a sultan, the irony is clear: the man who speaks of kings forgiving their servants' faults presents himself as a slave in need of a beloved's pardon.

The fourth couplet alludes (telmih) to the legend of the water of life (âb-ı hayat). In Islamic narratives Zülkarneyn (Alexander) and Hızır (Khidr) enter the "land of darkness" in search of the water of immortality; Hızır finds the water and drinks it, while Alexander does not. Adlî attributes this failure to a lack of light: had a speck of light from the beloved's face reached Alexander, he too would have found his way. The beloved's face thus takes the place of a sun guiding the way in the dark; there is antithesis (tezat) between "zulmet" (darkness) and "pertev" (light).

The fifth couplet uses the motif of grass growing on a grave. In divan poetry the narcissus is compared to the eye; "şehlâ", in its dictionary sense, means a hazel eye with a slight, languishing squint. From the grave of the lover who dies with the image of the beloved's languid eye, narcissi resembling that eye will grow. "Bitiser" is a conjugation expressing the future in Old Anatolian Turkish and means "will grow".

In the sixth couplet the eyebrow is likened to the qibla, that is, to the mihrab; the arched shape of the eyebrow recalls the arch of the prayer niche. The ascetic (zâhid) counts this a sin, while the lover says he will not turn his face from his "secdegâh" (place of prostration). The words qibla, prostration and ascetic form a congruence of images drawn from the world of worship. The closing couplet ties all this complaint to the idea of pre-eternity: affliction and pain are the share given to Adlî in pre-eternity, so one must give up wailing and accept the decree.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Yavuz Bayram (ed.), Adlî Dîvânı (Dîvân-ı Sultân Bâyezîd-i Sânî), Ankara: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yay., 2018, p. 151, poem no. 113 (manuscript variants in the footnote on the same page). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr
  • Yavuz Bayram, "Sultan İkinci Bâyezîd-i Velî (Adlî) Dîvânı'nın British Library Nüshasında İmlâ Husûsiyetleri", Turkish Studies 3/6 (Fall 2008), pp. 109-142 (the future suffix -ısar, p. 120).

Academic studies

Online sources