Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Çü fırṣat ʿıyşe el virdi geçürgil ḫoş bu devrânı
Bu güni ḳoma yarına ki getürmez bu devr ânı

In English

1. Since opportunity has made room for pleasure and merrymaking, spend this age happily. Do not put off today's pleasure until tomorrow, for the turning of time does not bring that moment back again.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The couplet is the opening couplet (matla) of a ghazal (gazel); both of its lines end in the same sound. The rest of the ghazal is unknown, and there is no record that the poet left a divan. In Latîfî's edition the rhyme is built between "devrânı" and "devr ânı". The first means "this age", this period of time; the second is made of "devr" (the turning of time, the wheel of heaven) and "ân" (moment). The rhyming of two word groups that sound almost identical but carry different meanings is the figure that divan poetry calls cinas (paronomasia). In the texts of Kınalızâde and Hüsameddin, however, both lines end in "bu devrânı". Since rhyming the same word with the same meaning was considered a fault, Latîfî's reading, which keeps the cinas, may be thought closer to the original wording; this is our inference. The editions of the biographical anthologies of poets (tezkire) do not indicate the metres of the couplets.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The subject of the couplet is one of the oldest themes of divan poetry: life is short, the heavens turn and a moment that has passed does not return; so one must live while the chance is there. The word "ʿıyş" means both living and pleasure, the gathering of wine and company. "El virmek" means that the possibility of something has arisen; here the poet imagines opportunity as a person holding out a hand. In the second line "today" and "tomorrow" are set against each other, and this antithesis is joined to the idea of return carried by the word "devr": revolving time brings and takes away everything, but never brings the same moment twice. The difference between the manuscripts, "getürmek" (to bring) and "götürmek" (to carry away), also shifts the meaning. In Latîfî's reading "getürmez", time does not bring that moment back; in Kınalızâde's reading "götürmez", time does not carry today's pleasure over to tomorrow. Both readings lead to the same counsel.

Historical Context

When and on what occasion the couplet was composed is unknown. Latîfî, having said that the poet had a playful nature in conversation while his poetry lacked the embroidery of imagination, gives this couplet with the words "Mâhiyyeti bu maṭlaʿdan ẓâhirdür", what he was can be seen from this matla. Kınalızâde cites the same couplet as the "güzîde", the choicest, of the poet's opening couplets, and Hüsameddin records it once more when quoting Latîfî. For the poet's life, see the article Cenânî Hüseyin Çelebi in this category. It is striking that the best-known surviving couplet of a poet who served as secretary at Şehzade Ahmed's court in Amasya, and who is recorded as having been executed shortly after the prince's death, should be an opening couplet calling on the reader to live the moment; there is, however, no source linking the couplet to the poet's fate.

Bibliography

Primary sources

Online sources