Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Gelin bir nasihat eyleyim size
Gel nasihatımı tuta gör kardaş
Nasihat eylersen başına eyle
Herkes nasibini alıyor kardaş
Taşıma su ile değirmen dönmez
Ali’nin sırrına kimseler ermez
Sen onu göründe o seni görmez
Bakınca bell’olur seveni kardaş
Onun için seçilir ruh kısımı
Elham suresidir onun taksimi
Yüz on dört suredir oku Yasin’i
Yazılmış vechine sırrınan kardaş
Teslim oldum tevellüdüm bilmeye
Hakkın emri buyruğuna girmeye
Meylim vardır bir güzeli sevmeye
Sevilir güzel de halınan kardaş
Derviş Edna’m bir halınan gezerler
Arif olan mânâsından sezerler
Bir gün olur can cesetten üzerler
Ol zaman bell’olur karinen kardaş

In English

1. Come, let me give you a word of counsel; come, keep my counsel, brother. If you give counsel, give it first to yourself; everyone receives his share, brother.

2. A mill will not turn with carried water; no one reaches the secret of Ali. You see him, he does not see you; when you look, the one who loves becomes plain, brother.

3. For this the portion of the soul is chosen; its division is the sura Elham. There are a hundred and fourteen suras, read the Yasin; it is written on his face with a secret, brother.

4. I submitted to knowing my birth, to entering God's command and His precepts. I have an inclination to love a beauty; a beauty too is loved for her inner state, brother.

5. I am Derviş Edna; the saints go about in a certain state, the wise sense it from its meaning. A day will come when they part the soul from the body; then it becomes plain who your companion is, brother.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

Each quatrain ends by calling out "kardaş" (brother); in the first quatrain the word also appears in the second line. The article classes the poem as a nasihatname, a poem of counsel. The first quatrain begins with the words "size, eyle", and the first three lines of the later quatrains rhyme as "dönmez, ermez, görmez", "kısımı, taksimi, Yasin'i", "bilmeye, girmeye, sevmeye", "gezerler, sezerler, üzerler". The phrase "a hundred and fourteen suras" in the third quatrain gives the number of suras in the Qur'an. The text runs to five quatrains in the eleven-syllable syllabic metre; in the last quatrain the pen name (mahlas) "Derviş Edna'm" can be read.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem opens directly in the voice of counsel and sets down the first rule of counselling: whoever would give advice must first give it to himself. In the second quatrain a proverb known to the people, "a mill will not turn with carried water", enters the poem; the path cannot be walked with knowledge borrowed from others. The same quatrain says that no one reaches Ali's secret; the line "you see him, he does not see you" stands in the source as "göründe" and can be read in two ways, and the plainer meaning has been chosen in the translation.

The third quatrain names the hundred and fourteen suras of the Qur'an, the Elham, that is the Fatiha, and the Yasin; but it implies that the true book is written "with a secret" on the human face. The view that regards the human face as a book to be read is widespread in Alevi-Bektashi thought. In the fourth quatrain the inclination to love a beauty is qualified by the saying that a beauty is loved for her "state", her inner world and bearing. In the closing quatrain the moment of death is recalled as a test: when the soul leaves the body it will become plain who one's companion is, the one who stays at one's side.

Bibliography

Online sources