Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ūlü Fā‘ilātü Mefā‘īlü Fā‘ilün

Dirsüñ ki zaḫm-ı tīr-i ġam irişmeye dile
Var kimseye muḳābele itme hedef gibi

In English

1. If you would have the wound of the arrow of grief not reach your heart, go, and do not stand facing anyone like a target.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The text before us is a single couplet written in the "mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātü mefā‘īlü fā‘ilün" pattern of the muzari 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-two 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 ("dile / gibi"); 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.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet takes the form of advice and addresses, with "dirsüñ" (if you would), the poet himself or a general listener. It rests on a comparison: a target is hit by the arrow because it stands directly facing the archer; so too, if a man does not stand face to face with anyone, the arrow of grief will not reach him. The word "muḳābele" (facing, confronting) describes the position of the target in relation to the archer and also the encounters of human relations; the point of the couplet is the overlap of these two senses. There is a congruence of images (tenasüp) between the words "tīr" (arrow), "zaḫm" (wound) and "hedef" (target). These observations are our own. One senses in the couplet a counsel of seclusion that presents keeping away from people as the way to be protected from grief; this too is our interpretation. As the rest of the ghazal is not extant, it cannot be told whether the advice is given in earnest or with reproachful bitterness. The word "dil" in the first line means heart; the verb "irişmek" (to reach) also describes an arrow arriving at its target and so prepares the comparison from the start. This too is our own observation.

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. 372, ghazal no. 152 (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) and p. 69 (single-couplet fragments), 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