Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün

Ḫalḳa cihān gülistān gülzār baña zindān
İl ġonce gibi ḫandān ben ebr gibi giryān
Her ḳaṭre ḳaṭre ḳan kim dökildi çeşm-i terden
Erbāb-ı ‘ışḳa oldı tesbīḥ-i la‘l u mercān
Gizler kemān ḳaşından müjgān oḳın benümçün
Kāfir gözüñe ki yā Rab n’itdüm a müsilmān
Geyüp ḳabā-yı gülgūn ey serv-ḳad ṣalınsañ
Ḳalmazdı ḫalḳ içinde çāk olmaduḳ girībān
Bir būseye ḥabībüm cān almaġ eylemiş narḫ
Ta‘cīl it Baṣīrī kim tīz olur peşīmān

In English

1. To people the world is a rose garden; to me the rose garden is a prison. People laugh like an opening bud, I weep like a cloud.

2. Every drop of blood that fell drop by drop from my wet eye became for the people of love a rosary of ruby and coral.

3. The beloved hides the arrow of her lashes for me behind the bow of her brow; O Lord, O Muslims, what have I done to that infidel eye of yours? (The brow is likened to a bow and the lashes to arrows. The arrow is held ready behind the bow; so the beloved lies in ambush to strike the lover. The words "Kāfir gözüñe ki" at the start of the second line can also be understood as "look at your infidel eye".)

4. O you of cypress stature, if you put on the rose-coloured robe and swayed, no collar among the people would remain untorn. (Everyone would tear his collar in the madness of love.)

5. My beloved has fixed the official price (narh) of one kiss as the taking of a soul; hurry, Basîrî, for she quickly repents.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a ghazal (gazel) of five couplets in the muzâri family of aruz (quantitative metre), in the pattern "mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün"; the edition does not state the metre, which emerges from scansion. Scansion requires some lengthening of vowels (imâle) in Turkish words. With the edition's reading, the second half of the first line ("gülzār baña zindān") is one syllable short; the line is printed thus in the page image of the edition as well, so it is not known whether the fault comes from the manuscript or from the reading. In the second couplet the metre also limps at the word "dökildi". The ghazal has no redif (refrain word); the rhyme is the sound "-ān": zindān, giryān, mercān, müsilmān, girībān, peşīmān. The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last couplet. The ghazal is number XXI in Ahmet Kartal's edition. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal opens with a contrast expressing the lover's discord with the world. While to people the world is a rose garden (gülistân), to the lover the rose garden (gülzâr) is a prison; while people laugh like a bud, the lover weeps like a cloud. In divan poetry the opening of a bud is likened to laughter and a cloud's rain to weeping. So the first couplet sets up two opposing pictures in its two lines: rose and prison, bud and cloud, laughing and weeping.

In the second couplet the drops of blood falling from the lover's eye turn into the beads of a rosary. The bloody tears are likened by their colour to ruby (la‘l) and coral. That a rosary is a religious object also gives the couplet a Sufi air, treating love as a kind of worship. Kartal shows that in another couplet too Basîrî calls the drops of his heart's blood "tesbīḥ-i mercān", a coral rosary; this must have been one of the poet's favourite images.

The third couplet rests on the familiar comparison of brow and lashes to bow and arrow. The beloved keeps the arrows of her lashes ready on the bow of her brow and saves them for the lover. In the second line the lover cries out: "Yā Rab, n’itdüm a müsilmān", O Lord, O Muslims, what have I done? The contrast between the "infidel" eye and "müsilmân" is the point of the couplet. In divan poetry the beloved's eye is called "infidel" because of its mercilessness; the lover's appeal to Muslims for help turns this image into a scene.

In the fourth couplet the beloved is called cypress-statured (serv-ḳad), and the poet imagines her swaying in a rose-coloured robe. Everyone who saw this sight would fall into the madness of love and tear his collar. In divan poetry tearing one's collar is the familiar gesture of the lover who has lost himself. The last couplet uses the language of the market. "Narh" is the officially fixed sale price; the beloved has set the narh of a kiss at one soul. The poet tells himself "ta‘cīl it", hurry, for the beloved "tīz olur peşīmān", quickly repents. The words narh, ta‘cîl and repentance form a congruence of images (tenasüp) recalling every stage of a bargain: the price is set, and the deal must be closed before the seller changes her mind. This reckoning, which counts a soul cheap in exchange for a kiss, closes the ghazal on a playful note.

Bibliography

Online sources