Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilün

Ey ṣabâ var söyle derdim yâre Allah ‘aşḳına
Nâme-i zârım yetir gülzâre Allah ‘aşḳına

In English

1. O morning breeze, go and tell my sorrow to the beloved, for the love of God; carry my lamenting letter to the rose garden, for the love of God.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is recorded in the cönk as a ghazal (gazel). The ghazal is the aruz verse form whose opening couplet (matla) rhymes within itself and whose other couplets are tied to that rhyme; folk poets also used this form. Because Hakverdioğlu's article publishes only the first verse unit of each poem in the cönk, we know only the opening couplet of this poem. The refrain is "Allah aşkına"; the rhyme is the "-âre" sound in "yâre / gülzâre". The identification of the metre is ours; as is usual in the aruz poems of folk poets, some syllables may not fit the pattern exactly. To whom and on what occasion the poem was composed is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Sabâ, the light wind that blows at dawn, is in divan and folk poetry the messenger who carries news between lover and beloved. Unable to reach the beloved, the lover entrusts his sorrow to the wind; the "nâme-i zâr", the lamenting letter, is the complaint the lover writes or sends. "Gülzâr", the rose garden, stands for the place where the beloved is; the beloved is thus thought of both as the rose and as the garden where the rose grows. The plea "Allah aşkına" ("for the love of God") in the refrain comes from everyday speech and gives the couplet a sincere, urgent tone; by keeping the word "aşk" (love) in the refrain it also recalls the poem's main subject in every couplet.

Historical Context

The poem is recorded under the name of Erzurumlu Emrah in the Merzifon Cönkü, a manuscript miscellany held in Metin Hakverdioğlu's own library and introduced by him in 2019. The cönk contains eleven of Emrah's poems, three in syllabic metre and eight in aruz. In cönks and miscellanies Emrah's poems have become mixed with those of Ercişli Emrah and of his apprentice Tokatlı Nûrî; the record in the cönk is therefore not by itself conclusive proof of authorship. For the poet's connection with Merzifon and his other poems in the cönk, see the page on Erzurumlu Emrah. The poem is on page 27 of the cönk and page 547 of the article; its full text is in the cönk itself and has not been published to date.

Bibliography

Online sources