Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Edna hallerimden haber sorarsan
Cihan yedi kere tülenecektir
Hallacı Mansur kalemin çalınca
Gecesi belirsiz gün olacaktır
Âhir şu dünyayı küffar alacak
Mehdi çıkıp fethetmeye gelecek
İsrafil sur düdüğünü çalacak
İnsan cem evine birlenecektir
Âhir bu dünyada bozkurt kalacak
Azrail kendi canını alacak
Gün insan üstüne bir mil kalacak
İnsan susuzluktan kırılacaktır
Al yeşil kırmızı cennet nakışı
Aşıklara ihsan olur bakışı
Üç bin yıllık yoldur kangal yokuşu
Cehennemlik kullar yorulacaktır
Söyleyen alimdir mânâ yüz olur
Kırk yıl yağmur yağar bahar yaz olur
Erir dağlar taşlar dünya düz olur
Mağribden meşırık görünecektir
Şeytana uyup da evin aldıran
Zahitlere hak sırrını bildiren
Dergaha gelmesin nefes öldüren
Yer gök arasından silinecektir
Arif olan bu mânâdan anlaya
Gerçek olan ikrarından dönmeye
Günahlı günahsız ayırt olmaya
Hak mizan terazi kurulacaktır
Okuduğum ayet farz ile sünnet
Halka yaratılmış cehennem cennet
Şefaat etmeye gelir Muhammed
Her sualler orda sorulacaktır
Derviş Edna’m der ki Mehdi-yi zaman
Bunca erenlerle yapmışım cevlan
Adını sevdiğim on iki imam
Onların davası görülecektir

In English

1. Edna, if you ask for news of my state, the world will come green again seven times. When Hallac-ı Mansur strikes his pen, it will be a day whose night cannot be told.

2. In the end the unbelievers will take this world; the Mahdi will appear and come to conquer it. Israfil will sound the trumpet; people will be gathered together in the cemevi.

3. In the end only the grey wolf will remain in this world; Azrael will take his own life. The sun will come down to a mile above people's heads; people will perish of thirst.

4. The ornaments of paradise are red, green and crimson; its glance is a gift to the lovers. The Kangal slope is a road of three thousand years; those bound for hell will grow weary there.

5. The one who speaks is learned, the meaning of what he says becomes a hundred. Rain will fall for forty years, spring will turn to summer. Mountains and stones will melt, the world will become flat; the east will be seen from the west.

6. Whoever follows Satan and has his house taken from him, whoever discloses God's secret to the zealots, whoever kills the breath, let him not come to the lodge; he will be wiped out from between earth and sky.

7. Let the wise understand this meaning; let the true one not turn back from his pledge. So that the sinful and the sinless are not confused, God's scale of judgement will be set up.

8. The verse I recite is duty and custom; hell and paradise were created for the people. Muhammad comes to intercede; every question will be asked there.

9. Derviş Edna says: Mahdi of the age, I have wandered about with so many saints. The case of the Twelve Imams, whose names I love, will be heard.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

Each of the nine quatrains foretells: the last lines end with the future suffix "-acaktır, -ecektir" (will be) ("tülenecektir, olacaktır, birlenecektir, kırılacaktır" and so on). The rhyme pattern shifts slightly from quatrain to quatrain; in most of them the first three lines are linked ("alacak, gelecek, çalacak", "nakışı, bakışı, yokuşu", "anlaya, dönmeye, olmaya"). The metre is the eleven-syllable syllabic measure. The pen name (mahlas) shows in two places: as an address, "Edna", in the first quatrain, and as "Derviş Edna'm" in the last. The article explains "tülemek" as to grow green, to come back to life; "mağrib" as west, "meşrık" as east, "cevlan" as wandering.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem lists the narratives of the end of time and the Last Day through the mouth of a dervish. The coming of the Mahdi, Israfil blowing the trumpet, the sun drawing down to a mile above people, the setting up of the scale of judgement and the Prophet's intercession are elements known from Islamic accounts of the Last Day as well. Derviş Edna adds details that come from Alevi-Bektashi belief: people being "made one" in the cemevi, the pen of Hallac-ı Mansur, the "case" of the Twelve Imams being heard. The line in the first quatrain, "the world will come green again seven times", expresses the idea of the world returning to life in cycles and agrees with the notion of cycles and changing garments seen in Derviş Edna's other deyiş.

The sixth quatrain adds a note of counsel. It asks that whoever discloses God's secret to the zealots, that is, to those outside the path, and whoever "kills the breath", should not come to the lodge. "Nefes" is both the name of the poetic genre and the grace handed on with the breath; killing the nefes can be understood as destroying that word and that grace, a reading that is ours. The source does not explain which narrative lies behind expressions such as "the grey wolf will remain" in the third quatrain and "the Kangal slope" in the fourth.

Bibliography

Online sources