Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Seni ben sevmişem şāhā vü ölince seviserem
Ḳaġan aslan bu bįşede nicesi ḳorḫa ʿafʿafdan

In English

1. O king (beloved), I have loved you and will love you until I die; how should a raging lion in this forest fear "ʿafʿaf". (The source does not explain the word "ʿafʿaf"; it may be understood as an imitative word for barking; this reading is our own.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The couplet is taken from Ahmet Kavaklıyazı's article; Kavaklıyazı cites it as the sixth couplet of ghazal 612 in Muharrem Ergin's edition and by folio 137v in the TDK facsimile of 2020. Since its lines do not rhyme, it is not the opening couplet of the ghazal (gazel). The source does not give the whole ghazal, and Ergin's edition could not be consulted for this study. The source does not give the metre. In Kavaklıyazı's text the long "i" sound is shown with the letter "į" ("bįşede"); this spelling has been kept as in the source. The poet's divan, its editions and his other poems are discussed in Kadı Burhaneddin: Literary Persona, Divan and Poems.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

According to Kavaklıyazı, in this couplet the poet addresses the beloved as he would a sultan: the address "şāhā" (O king) shows this. Saying that he has loved the beloved and will love him until he dies, the poet in the second line stresses his fearlessness by likening himself to a raging lion. Just as nothing in the forest can frighten a raging lion, nothing will keep the poet from the beloved's path. "Bįşe" (bîşe) means forest or reed-bed in Persian and is known as the lion's lair.

In the couplet the poet speaks of himself directly as a lion and uses no particle of comparison such as "like"; since what the thing is compared to is named and the thing compared is not, this is a metaphor (istiare). The "ʿafʿaf" that the lion will not fear, if it describes barking, calls to mind the noise of the rivals and censurers who try to turn the lover from his path; this reading is our own. The same expression "kağan aslan" also appears as roaring lions in one of the poet's tuyughs; Kavaklıyazı notes that it is used in the divan in poems 1395 and 1445 as well. A ruler-poet likening himself as lover to a lion brings the love language of the ghazal close to his warrior identity.

Bibliography

  • Ahmet Kavaklıyazı, "Kadı Burhaneddin'i Anlamak: Divanındaki Bazı Tabirlerin Çözümlenmesi", Selçuk Türkiyat, 56, 2022, p. 316, ghazal 612, couplet 6 (Ergin 1980), TDK 2020 facsimile fol. 137v. https://acikerisim.selcuk.edu.tr/items/5207c1f3-aca0-43f1-9c9e-fef3350cf7bc
  • Muharrem Ergin (ed.), Kadı Burhanettin Divanı, İstanbul: İstanbul Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Yayınları, 1980 (not consulted directly; text cited through Kavaklıyazı 2022).

Online sources