Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Bagrumı yakdı dile nâr-ı mahabbet düşdi
N'ola âh eyler isem câna harâret düşdi
Seyr kıldum ten-i sîminini hammâm içre
'Arz-ı hâl eyledüm ol dil-bere halvet düşdi

In English

1. The fire of love fell into my heart and burned my breast; is it any wonder if I sigh? Heat has fallen upon my soul.

2. I gazed at her silver body in the bath; I laid my plea before that heart-stealer, for privacy (halvet) had fallen to my lot.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The refrain "düşdi", fell, is put to a different use in each of the two couplets. In the matla fire falls: the fire of love has fallen into the heart and burned the breast; the lover's sighing is the natural result of heat falling upon his soul. A congruence of images (tenasüp) of fire is built among "nâr", "harâret" and "yakmak", to burn.

The second couplet moves the scene to a bathhouse and becomes the liveliest part of the ghazal. In the bath the lover has seen the beloved's "ten-i sîmîn", her body shining like silver. The words "halvet düşdi" work with two senses. Halvet is the name of the private washing cubicle in a bathhouse; the same word also means being alone together, away from others. Because he found the chance to be alone with the beloved in the halvet, the lover made his "arz-ı hâl" to her, that is, he laid open his trouble as if presenting a petition. That the word arz-ı hâl comes from the language of the council and the court finds a fitting place in a couplet from the pen of a judge-poet.

Harâret and halvet rhyme on -et; in the matla the rhyme falls between mahabbet and harâret. Kınalızâde gives the two couplets as a single piece with the word "Diger". The rest of the ghazal is unknown.

Bibliography

Online sources