Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilün

Dökme ḳanın ehl-i ‘ışḳuñ ẓulm-ile nā-ḥaḳ yire
Çün bilürsin pādişāhum yirde ḳalmaz ḳanumuz

In English

1. Do not shed the blood of the people of love unjustly and with cruelty; for you know, my king, our blood does not stay on the ground (it will be avenged).

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The text before us is a single couplet written in the "fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün" pattern of the remel family of aruz (quantitative metre). Özkat gathers Fazlî's couplets found in the biographical anthologies of poets (tezkire) at the end of the ghazal section, under the heading "Couplets Appearing Independently in the Tezkires"; according to Özkat the fourteen fragments under this heading amount to twenty couplets. This couplet is numbered as ghazal a hundred and fifty in that section and is taken from the tezkire of Kâfzâde Fâizî; as Özkat reports, Kâfzâde says that he copied the couplets after seeing Fazlî's divan. There is no rhyme between the lines ("yire / ḳanumuz"); Özkat counts this couplet among the eight fragments surviving as single couplets. It is not known to whom or when it was written.

According to Özkat, Kâfzâde repeats almost word for word the information given by Riyâzî about Fazlî's death, namely that the poet died in 971 and that Gelibolulu Âlî composed a chronogram on his death with the words "Fażlī öldi" (Fazlî has died). Most of Fazlî's ghazals that have come down complete are of five couplets; according to Özkat, eighty-three of the hundred and twenty-four complete ghazals are of this length. The length of the ghazal to which this lone couplet belonged, however, is not known.

Özkat mentions the couplet in two places in his study. Among the couplets alluding to proverbs he cites it as an example of the proverb "Alma mazlumun âhını, çıkar âheste âheste" (do not draw the sigh of the wronged, for it comes out slowly, slowly); here the reference of the couplet is given as "G.149/1". In the list of idioms, however, he gives it with the reference "G.150/1" as an example of the idiom "kanı yerde kalmamak" (one's blood not staying on the ground). In the edition the text is ghazal a hundred and fifty; that the reference in the section on proverbs is a slip is our own observation.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet addresses the beloved in words expected of a just ruler. The beloved is called "my king" and is warned not to shed the blood of lovers unjustly; for, as the idiom "kanı yerde kalmamak" says, blood shed unjustly is avenged sooner or later. The proverb indicated by Özkat rests on the same thought: the sigh of the wronged finds its mark, even if slowly. This warning addressed by the lover to the beloved is reproach taking the form of an appeal for justice made to a ruler. In the phrases "nā-ḥaḳ yire" (unjustly, literally "to the ground unjustly") and "yirde ḳalmaz" (does not stay on the ground), the repetition of the word "yer" (ground) binds the two lines together: the blood is shed "to the ground" unjustly, but does not "stay on the ground". The word "ḳan" (blood) also occurs in both lines (ḳanın, ḳanumuz). These observations are our own.

Bibliography

  • Mustafa Özkat, Kara Fazlî'nin Hayatı, Eserleri, Edebî Kişiliği ve Dîvânı (İnceleme-Tenkitli Metin), MA thesis, Marmara University Institute of Turkic Studies, Istanbul 2005, p. 371, ghazal no. 150 (Kâfzâde Fâizî's tezkire); also p. 21 (Kâfzâde's notes on the divan and the poet's death), p. 62 (the couplets in the tezkires and the complete ghazals), p. 69 (single-couplet fragments), p. 90 (proverbs) and p. 93 (idioms), https://katalog.marmara.edu.tr/veriler/yordambt/cokluortam/5E/T0051713.pdf.
  • Kâfzâde Fâizî, Zübdetü'l-Eş'âr, manuscript, Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Collection no. 1325 (as cited by Özkat).

Online sources