Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: mef'ûlü mefâîlü mefâîlü feûlün (hezec). The edition does not mention the ahreb branch of hezec; the identification is ours.
Bir şâha kulam kim kulı sultân-ı cihândur
Mihr-i ruhı şems-i felege nûr-feşândur
Katlüme ya müjgânı ya tîri sebeb olmuş
Çün öldüriser tîr hemân tîğ hemândur
Zülfüñ şeb-i Kadr oldı kaşuñ ‘îd hilâli
Vasluñ dem-i ‘îd oldı firâkuñ ramazândur
Ol Yûsuf-i hüsn urdı dile nîze-i hecri
Cânumı alan nîze degül belki sinândur
‘Avnî gözi Mahmûd şehüñ bakduğı bu kim
Mülkin dahılar zabt ider aña nigerândur
In English
1. I am the slave of such a king that his slave is the sultan of the world; the sun of his cheek sheds light on the sun in the sky.
2. Either his eyelash or his arrow has caused my death; since he means to kill, arrow and sword are all one.
3. Your locks have become the Night of Power, your brow the crescent of the feast; union with you is the time of the feast, separation from you is Ramadan.
4. That Joseph of beauty has thrust the spear of separation into my heart; what takes my life is not the spear but perhaps the Sinan (the spear's iron head, or the beloved surnamed Sinan).
5. O Avnî, the reason why the eye of King Mahmud looks so is this: others seize his realm, and he goes on watching.
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
Its opening couplet is very close to that of the eighteenth ghazal: there it is said "Bir şâha kul oldum ki cihân aña gedâdur" (I became the slave of a king whose beggar is the world), here "Bir şâha kulam kim kulı sultân-ı cihândur" (I am the slave of a king whose slave is the sultan of the world). The two ghazals are in the same metre, the "mef'ûlü mefâîlü mefâîlü feûlün" pattern of hezec, and build the same idea by two different roads: there the world is the king's beggar, here the sultan of the world is his slave. Here the redif is "-dur", a suffix; the words "cihân, feşân, hemân, ramazân, sinân, nigerân" rhyme on "-ân".
Meaning and Figures of Speech
In the ghazal proper names and words of the calendar are used as material for double meanings. The second couplet likens the eyelash to a sword and the glance to an arrow; Doğan counts this as an unordered lef ü neşr, since in the second line arrow and sword are named in reverse order. The third couplet gathers four comparisons into a religious calendar: the black and precious hair is the Night of Power, the thin, curved brow the crescent of the feast, separation, which keeps one from every pleasure, is Ramadan, and union is the feast.
In the fourth couplet the beloved is a Joseph in beauty. As Doğan points out, "Sinan" is known as a byname of the prophet Joseph and is used as a man's name; the word also means the iron tip of a spear, a spearhead. What takes the lover's life is not the spear itself but its sinan; or else it is a beloved named Yusuf and surnamed Sinan. The couplet carries both readings together.
Historical Context
The final couplet is one whose interpretation Doğan changed between two editions. In the first edition he read the word "dahılar" as "dahîler" and gave it the sense of brigands who plunder the city by night; in the second edition he established that the couplet alludes to a story in Sadi's Gulistan. According to the story, one of the kings of Khorasan saw Sultan Mahmud of Ghazna in a dream a hundred years after his death: his whole body had rotted and turned to dust, but his eyes were turning in their sockets and looking about. Only a dervish could interpret the dream: Mahmud is still looking on, because his realm is in the hands of others. Relying on this story, which he quotes from Sûdî's commentary on the Gulistan, Doğan says that "King Mahmud" is not the historical Mahmud of Ghazna but one of the names chosen for the beloved in divan poetry, a name that recalls the Ghaznavid story.
On this interpretation the beloved's realm is the lover's heart. When love, or the beloved's image, comes to this heart like a king, the soul, reason, patience and composure vacate the throne to receive him; but as long as they stay in the heart, they are strangers. The beloved looks at these strangers who have occupied his land with anger, like the eyes of Mahmud of Ghazna. For the same thought Doğan lists couplets by Necâtî, Emrî, Fuzûlî and Rahîmî; Rahîmî's words "her mülkün olur sultânı bir" (every realm has a single sultan) say most briefly that love and reason cannot dwell in the same heart.
Bibliography
- Fâtih Sultan Mehmed (Avnî), Fâtih Dîvânı ve Şerhi / Dīwān of Sultan Mehmed II with Commentary, ed. Muhammet Nur Doğan, English trans. Michael D. Sheridan, 3rd ed., Istanbul: Türkiye Yazma Eserler Kurumu Başkanlığı, 2023, poem 23, pp. 223-228 (manuscript: Millet, Ali Emîrî Manzum 305, fol. 8a). https://ekitap.yek.gov.tr/urun/fatih-divani-ve-serhi--ucuncu-baski-_794.aspx
Online sources
