Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Zulmi az eylese ey dil o perî cânun idi
Cevri insâf ile itse hele cânânun idi

In English

1. O heart, had that fairy lessened her cruelty, she would have been as your soul; had she tormented you with fairness, she would at least have been your beloved. (The couplet can be read in two ways; see the commentary.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

The two lines are built on the same pattern and compare two degrees of love. The lover addresses his own heart: had that fairy-faced one lessened her cruelty a little, she would have been "cânun", your soul, your most precious possession; had she inflicted her torment with fairness, she would "hele", at least, have been "cânânun", your beloved. The closeness of sound and sense between cân and cânân is the foundation of the couplet. The word cânân means "souls" and denotes the beloved; the poet appears to set it one degree below the soul.

This difference of degree gives the couplet a surprise, for in divan poetry cânân is usually held above cân. The couplet can therefore be understood in two ways: either the poet deliberately reversed the usual order, or the word "hele" is used here in the sense of "indeed, precisely" and the second line rises above the first. Kınalızâde gives the couplet without comment; none of the other witnesses has it. Cruelty and torment, the beloved's two traditional habits, are named one after the other; the poet wishes not to abolish them but only to lessen them and bind them to fairness. This measured wish seems to give the couplet the voice of a judge.

Bibliography

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