Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Tabib el çek yarelerim saraman
Dermansız bir derttir aşkın yaresi
Sen bu derdin ilacını bilemen
Söyünmez od durur aşkın küresi
Üç harf beş noktadır bu aşk denilen
Yedi iklim çâr köşede duyulan
İndallahta makbul kurban sayılan
İmam Hüseyin’dir ciğer paresi
Kerbelâ’nın şühedası yetmiş üç
Hiçbiri eylemedi Hâlikine suç
Mü’mine farz oldu Muharrem oruç
Sabreder su içmez Mü’min kanası
Bu dert bize Kerbelâ’dan mirastır
Gam ve elem Ehlüilah’a hevestir
Zeyneb’e toy düğün matemi yastır
Kan Ne boyandı Kasım kınası
Ey FEDAYİ aklın başa derersen
Yedi İklim çâr köşeyi ararsan
Adavetin temelini sorarsan
Sebeb Muaviye’dir Lânet Olası

In English

1. Physician, take your hand away, you cannot bind my wounds; the wound of love is an ailment without remedy. You cannot know the cure for this pain; the furnace of love is a fire that never goes out.

2. What is called love is three letters and five dots; it is heard in the seven climes and the four corners of the world. The one counted as an accepted sacrifice in God's sight, the darling of the heart, is Imam Hüseyin.

3. The martyrs of Karbala are seventy-three; none of them committed a sin against his Creator. The Muharram fast became a duty for the believers; the believer endures and does not drink water to quench his thirst.

4. This pain is our inheritance from Karbala; grief and sorrow are the desire of the friends of God. Zeyneb's wedding feast is mourning and lament; the henna of Kasım was dyed with blood.

5. O Fedâî, if you gather your wits, if you search the seven climes and the four corners, if you ask the root of this enmity, the cause is Muawiya, may he be cursed.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

This poem of five quatrains is a Karbala elegy in the eleven-syllable metre. The last lines of the quatrains form a rhyme based on the sound "-ası/-esi" in the words "yaresi, küresi, paresi, kanası, kınası, olası"; in the first quatrain "saraman, bilemen" rhyme with each other. The pen name appears in the last quatrain. In the source's typesetting the last line of the fourth quatrain is printed as "Kan Ne boyandı"; the sense "kana boyandı" (was dyed with blood) is clear, and the text has been left untouched. "Ehlüilah" in the same quatrain is likewise a typesetting corruption of "Ehlullah" (the friends of God).

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem advances by binding love and the grief of Karbala together. In the first quatrain the physician is sent away: the wound of love is not the business of medicine. The "three letters and five dots" of the second quatrain is letter symbolism pointing to the three letters and five dots of the word "aşk" (love) written in Arabic script. Cafer Özdemir quotes the same expression from another quatrain of the poet and notes that such letter play was used to open the meaning only to the initiated. The poet sees the highest example of love in Imam Hüseyin, regarded as a sacrifice accepted in God's sight.

The third and fourth quatrains list the main elements of the Alevi Muharram tradition: the seventy-three martyrs of Karbala, the Muharram fast and the abstention from water during it, the mourning of Zeyneb, and the blood-stained henna of Kasım, whose wedding is said in tradition to have taken place at Karbala. In the last quatrain the one responsible for the suffering is named openly. According to the story in the introduction to the divan, Fedâî left the madrasa because he could not bear his teacher's praise of Muawiya; this last quatrain shows that the attitude in that story continues in the poet's verse as well. Özdemir records that the Karbala event, Hüseyin and the twelve imams are frequently treated in Fedâî's poems.

Historical Context

In Yassıçal, where Fedâî Baba was born and died, and in the Alevi-Bektashi villages around it, the Muharram fast and the aşure tradition are still alive today; the tomb of Fedâî Baba in Yassıçal is also mentioned among the places visited in this region. The year and occasion of the poem are not known; its content suggests that it was composed to be recited at a Muharram gathering.

Bibliography

Online sources