Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilün (remel). The edition has no note on the measure; this pattern is our reading.

Bâğda gül ruhlerüñdür verd-i hamrâdan murâd
Kâmetüñdür râstî-i serv-i dil-ârâdan murâd
‘Işk derdidür cihânda ‘âşıka maksûd olan
Vasl-ı dilberdür hemîn bu dâr-ı dünyâdan murâd
Dûd-ı âhumdur felekde ebr-i bârândan garaz
Eşk-i çeşmümdür eşigüñde Süreyyâdan murâd
Çün ecel sulh itdürür âhir nizâ‘ı kaldurur
Pes nedür dünyâ içün bu kurı gavgâdan murâd
Beyti bozarsuñ rakîbi anma şi‘rüñde sakın
‘Avnî dilber vasfıdur çün şi‘r ü inşâdan murâd

In English

1. What is meant by the red rose in the garden is your rose cheeks; what is meant by the straightness of the heart-adorning cypress is your stature.

2. What the lover desires in the world is the pain of love; and the aim of this house of the world is only union with the beloved.

3. What is meant by the rain clouds in the sky is the smoke of my sighs; what is meant by the stars of the Pleiades at your threshold is the tears of my eye.

4. Since death in the end reconciles everyone and puts an end to strife, what then is the aim of this empty quarrel over the world?

5. O Avnî, never mention the rival in your poem, or you will ruin the couplet (the house); for the aim of poetry and fine prose is to describe the beloved.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

Each couplet closes by saying what something really means; the redif "murâd" is what is meant, the aim, the thing desired. The ghazal thus works like a dictionary: the rose means the cheek, the cypress the stature, the cloud the sigh, the Pleiades tears. The rhyme is the "-â" sound of the words "hamrâ, dil-ârâ, dünyâ, Süreyyâ, gavgâ, inşâ". The metre is remel, and the ghazal is complete in five couplets.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet builds two well-known comparisons of divan poetry in reverse. The poet does not liken the beloved's cheek to a rose or her stature to a cypress; he says that those who speak of the rose and the cypress in the garden really mean the beloved's cheek and stature. The places of the thing compared and the thing it is compared to have changed: the origin of beauty is in the beloved, and nature is a reflection of it. The word "râstî", while describing the cypress's straightness, also carries the sense of uprightness.

The second couplet says that the aim of this world is union. Doğan links the couplet to the Sufi view that explains creation through love: man's coming into being begins with love, and the purpose of life is divine union; this is why the lover wants the pain of love of his own accord. Doğan sets beside it Fuzûlî's couplet "Aşk derdiyle hoşem el çek ilâcımdan tabîb" (I am content with the pain of love, physician, keep your cure from me), which takes the same attitude. The third couplet explains the sky by the lover's state: the rain clouds are the smoke of sighs rising to heaven, and the stars of the Pleiades are the tears shed at the beloved's threshold. In Doğan's interpretation, since the threshold is higher than the sky, the tears that fall there are worth more than the stars.

The fourth couplet is the only one in the ghazal that states a general piece of wisdom: death in the end puts an end to all quarrels, and to strive for the world is in vain. This saying, from the pen of a ruler whose life was spent on campaigns, is in its own context part of a love ghazal and also turns to the strife with the rival. The final couplet is a statement of ars poetica on the aim of poetry. Poetry and fine prose (inşâ) exist to describe the beloved; if the rival's name enters a poem, the couplet is ruined. "Beyt" means both the two-line unit of verse and a house; according to Doğan, the poet, recalling the belief that a house in which the names of devils and jinn are spoken falls into misfortune, says that the rival's name will ruin the house of the poem.

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 8, pp. 134-136 (manuscript: Millet, Ali Emîrî Manzum 305, fol. 3b). https://ekitap.yek.gov.tr/urun/fatih-divani-ve-serhi--ucuncu-baski-_794.aspx

Online sources