Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Azı çoġı ʿömrüñ ancaḳ ey göñül bir ânımış
Pîr oldum ʿömrüme ṭoydum diyen yalanımış
Ehl-i ʿilmi nâra biri birinden öñdin yelteyen
Ṭaʿne-i ḥussâd u aʿdâ ġayret-i aḳrânımış
İki ḳardaş ḳanı kim dillerde dâ’im ẕikr olur
Dîde-i iḫvândan fürḳatde aḳan ḳanımış
Nâ-tüvânuñ ẓulm eliyle pârelenmiş baġrınuñ
Adı şehler maṭbaḫında ḳalye vü biryânımış
Ṭoludur gerçi meşâ’îḫden Emîrî şehrümüz
Az bulınur arada illâ ki nefsin tanımış

In English

1. O heart, the little and the much of a lifetime turn out to be a single moment; whoever says "I have grown old, I have had my fill of life" was lying.

2. What drives the people of learning to rush into the fire one before the other turns out to be the slander of the envious and of enemies and the jealousy of rivals. (The couplet can be read in two ways: "nâr" may be fire or the fire of hell; it may also be understood that the learned cast themselves into the fire by disparaging one another.)

3. The "blood of two brothers" always mentioned on people's tongues turns out to be the blood that flows from brothers' eyes in the hour of separation.

4. The name of the helpless man's heart, torn to pieces by the hand of oppression, turns out to be stew and roast in the kitchens of kings.

5. Emîrî, our city is indeed full of sheikhs, but among them few are found who have come to know their own self.

Literary and Historical Commentary

These five couplets, which Âşık Çelebi gives in his entry on Emîrî immediately after the kaside, are the only ghazal of the poet to reach us whole. The refrain word (redif) is the suffix "-mış", and this suffix sets the tone of the whole ghazal: each couplet announces a truth recognized after the fact. That life is but a moment, that the rivalry among the learned springs from jealousy, that a name on people's tongues is really something else, are all said with the sense of "so it turns out". The rhyme rests on the sound -ân: ân, yalan, akrân, kan, biryân, tan(ımış).

The ghazal's concern is the world and people. The second couplet touches on strife in learned circles and finds its source in slander and envy. The words weigh more when one recalls that their author was a madrasa professor and later an official at the head of the seyyids; there is no record, however, showing that the couplet points to a particular event. The third couplet plays on the name "blood of two brothers". This is the name of a dark red plant resin, also called dragon's blood; the poet reads the name word for word and ties it to the bloody tears that flow from brothers' eyes at the time of separation. The fourth couplet is about oppression and is striking in its harshness: the torn heart of the weak becomes food in the kitchens of kings. Kalye is a vegetable dish with meat, biryân is roast meat.

The last couplet is the most debatable point of the ghazal. The poet says that his city is full of sheikhs but that those who have come to know their own selves are few. Which city Emîrî means is not clear. According to Âşık Çelebi he was born in Bursa, according to Hüsameddin in Amasya; as naqib al-ashraf he also lived in Istanbul, and all three cities were known for their sheikhs. The couplet can be read as a criticism by Emîrî, himself counted among the people of Sufism, of the showy piety around him; the source does not explain to whom the poet addressed it.

Filiz Kılıç's edition notes that this ghazal is missing from manuscript F of the anthology. It does not appear in any other anthology or in Hüsameddin. His life and his other surviving poems are brought together in the article Emîrî (Seyyid Mahmûd).

Bibliography

Online sources