Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün

Her gice zülfüñ ġamından dil perīşāndur senüñ
Mihr-i ruḫsāruñla her gün şād u ḫandāndur senüñ
İy göñül Ferhād'a nisbet eyleme derdüm benüm
Kūh çāk itdiyse ol çāk itdügüñ cāndur senüñ
Ġamze-i ḫūn-rīz ü ḫūn-ḫᵛāruñ çi ger ḳattāldür
La‘l-i mey-gūnuñ velī ser-çeşme-i cāndur senüñ
Yūsuf-ı Mıṣrī'ye ḳıymet aġırı altunimiş
Ḫāk-i pāyuñ cevheri biñ cāna erzāndur senüñ
Genc-i ḥüsnüñ almaḳ ister düzd-i dil bilmez anı
Zülfüñüñ ejderleri aña nigeh-bāndur senüñ
Kātib-i Ḳudret berāt-ı ḥüsnüñ imlā ideli
Ḳaşlaruñ ṭuġrāsı ol menşūra ‘unvāndur senüñ
Sen bu ḥüsn ile cihān milkine ṣulṭān olalı
‘Adli ḳuluñ milket-i Rūm içre ṣulṭāndur senüñ

In English

1. The heart that belongs to you is distraught every night with grief for your curls, and every day it is glad and smiling with the sun of your cheek. (Black curls are likened to night, the bright cheek to the sun and the day.)

2. O heart, do not compare my pain with Ferhad's; if he split the mountain, what you have split is the soul. (Ferhad is the legendary lover who cut through the mountain to win Şirin.)

3. Though your blood-shedding, blood-drinking glance is a murderer, your wine-coloured ruby lip is the very fountainhead of the soul. (The glance kills, the lip gives life. Manuscript T reads "bil" for "ser" in "ser-çeşme".)

4. A price of his weight in gold was set, they say, on Joseph of Egypt; but for the jewel that is the dust of your feet even a thousand souls are cheap. (That is, to give a thousand souls as the price of that dust would be too little.)

5. The heart, a thief, wants to take the treasure of your beauty, but it does not know that the dragons of your curls are the guardians of that treasure. (In divan poetry a snake or dragon is thought to keep watch over a treasure; the winding curls are likened to these dragons.)

6. Ever since the Scribe of Divine Power (God) had the patent of your beauty written out, the tuğra of your brows has been the heading of that decree. (The berat and the menşur are documents issued by the sultan; the tuğra is the sign bearing the sultan's name that is drawn at the head of the document. The brow is likened to the tuğra for its curved shape.)

7. Ever since you became, with this beauty, sultan of the world's dominion, Adlî, your slave, has been sultan in the land of Rum.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal (gazel) has seven couplets and is written in the remel pattern "fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is "-dur senüñ" (is yours), and the rhyme is the sound "-ân": perîşân, handân, cân, erzân, nigeh-bân, unvân and sultân. The word "cân" (soul) serves twice as a rhyme, in the second and third couplets. The word "senüñ" (your) in the redif attaches to a different word in each couplet and turns the whole ghazal into an address to the beloved. In the edition the ghazal is found in all five manuscripts (OR, T, M1, M2, İBB) and stands in the section of the divan for refrains ending in the letter "kef". The only manuscript variant recorded in the edition is T's reading of "bil" for "ser" in the third couplet. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet sets night against day. The lover's heart is distraught at night with grief for the curls and glad by day with the sun of the cheek. The curls correspond to night by their blackness, the cheek to the sun by its brightness. The word "perîşân" means, in its dictionary sense, scattered, and so also calls to mind the disorder of the curls. The antithesis between night and day, distraught and glad, makes the two lines of the couplet equal counterparts. In the second couplet Ferhad is named. Ferhad split the mountain for Şirin, but what the lover's heart has split is its own soul. The legendary lover's labour is thus made to look smaller than the lover's pain.

The third and fourth couplets measure the beloved's worth. The glance is a murderer who sheds blood, while the lip is a wine-coloured fountain of the soul; the antithesis between shedding blood and giving life is plain. In the fourth couplet there is an allusion (telmih) to Joseph. Joseph is the prophet known for his beauty, and he was sold in Egypt; the poem says that a price of his weight in gold was set on him. The dust of the beloved's feet, however, is so precious that even a thousand souls are cheap beside it. "Erzân" means cheap in its dictionary sense. The words gold, jewel, price and cheapness form a congruence of images (tenasüp) drawn from buying and selling.

In the fifth couplet beauty is likened to a treasure, the lover's heart to a thief. The thief wants to take the treasure, but the dragons of the curls guard it. The idea of a snake or dragon keeping watch over a treasure is often used in divan poetry; the coils of the curls are likened to these guardians. The sixth couplet is built in the language of the palace chancery. God, as "the Scribe of Divine Power", has had a patent written out for the beloved's beauty, and the brows are the tuğra at the head of this decree. There is a strong congruence of images among the words kâtib (scribe), berat (patent), imlâ (dictation), tuğra, menşur (decree) and unvan (heading). These words are the everyday terms of the Ottoman chancery; the simile is all the more striking in the poetry of a sultan whose own tuğra was drawn at the head of his decrees.

The closing couplet is one of the plainest examples of the irony in Adlî's poems. The beloved has become sultan of the whole world through beauty; Adlî is the beloved's slave, and this slave is sultan within "milket-i Rûm", the land of Rum. "Rum" refers, in its dictionary sense, to Anatolia and the Ottoman lands. The couplet unites slave and sultan in one person: the poet is the beloved's slave, yet sultan in his own country. The closeness in sound and meaning between "milk" (dominion) and "milket" (country) sets the world's dominion against the land of Rum. To conclude from this expression that the ghazal was written in the years of the reign would be an interpretation; there is no information in the sources about the date of the poem.

Bibliography

  • Yavuz Bayram (ed.), Adlî Dîvânı (Dîvân-ı Sultân Bâyezîd-i Sânî), Ankara: Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications, 2018, p. 92, poem no. 54 (manuscript variants in the footnote on p. 92).

Online sources