Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: 11-syllable syllabic metre

Göňül sevdi ammâ ḫublar ḫuyunı
Cevr ü cefâsına liyâḳat mı var
Ol şâh-ı ḫûbâna vaṣf-ı ḥâlimi
Dilden ‘arẑ itmeye cesâret mi var

In English

1. The heart has loved, but (does it know) the ways of the fair ones; does it have the strength to bear their cruelty and torment? Does it have the courage to describe my state to that sultan of beauties, to set it before him in words?

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a koşma. The koşma is the most common verse form of minstrel poetry; it is built of quatrains and usually sung in an eleven-syllable metre. The lines have a caesura after 6+5 or 4+4+3 syllables; the syllable count is ours. Because Hakverdioğlu's article publishes only the first verse unit of each poem in the cönk, we know only the first quatrain of this poem. The second and fourth lines rhyme in "liyâkat / cesâret", with "mı var" as the refrain; the first and third lines come close to a half-rhyme in "huyunı / hâlimi". To whom and on what occasion the poem was composed is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The quatrain is the lover speaking to his own heart. The heart has loved, but is it worthy of, can it endure, the "cevr ü cefâ", the cruelty and torment, of the fair ones? The second question completes the first: the beloved is "şâh-ı hûbân", the sultan of the beauties; just as a servant hesitates to lay his grievance before a ruler, the lover lacks the courage to describe his state. This comparison, which makes the beloved a sovereign and the lover a subject presenting a petition, is a conceit that passed from divan poetry into folk poetry. The questions ending in "mı var" in the refrain remain unanswered and give the quatrain an air of hesitation.

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 88 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