Original Text (Mixed Languages)

Metre: Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilātün Fā‘ilün

ايّها السّاقي ادر كاس الهدي
K’eyleyem bir cür‘asına cān fedā
Ḳahrı ġam bezminde cānı ġamzede
Ṣun beru ḳatı o cām-ı ġam-zedā
Ṣun beru ol cāmı mest it şöyle kim
Ṭoymayam olursa cān tenden cüdā
Ṣun beru ol cām-ı nābı kim anuñ
Neşvesinde mestdür bāy u gedā
Cām-ı tevḥīd ile ḳalbi pāk ḳıl
Dilde hergiz ḳalmasun ġayr-ı Ḫudā
Muṭribā billāh söylet sāzuñı
Naġme-i ‘uşşāḳdan virsün ṣadā
Sensin iy Fażlī anuñ [kim] dirlügi
Vechüñ el-bāḳī ve fānī mā-‘adā

Reading of the Arabic-script line in Latin script: 1. Eyyühe’s-sāḳī edir ke’se’l-hüdā / K’eyleyem bir cür‘asına cān fedā

In English

1. O cupbearer, pass round the cup of guidance, so that I may sacrifice my life for a single sip of it. (Özkat translates the Arabic line as "Cupbearer, pass round the cup and hand it to me too"; he does not render the word "el-hüdā" (guidance, the right path) in his translation.)

2. In the gathering of sorrow, hand at once to the one whose soul is grieved by affliction that cup which drives sorrow away.

3. Hand that cup over and make me so drunk that I would not feel it even if the soul parted from the body. (We have understood the word "Ṭoymayam" in the sense of "may I not feel"; if it is read as "may I not be sated", the line means that even if the soul parted from the body I would not have my fill of this cup.)

4. Hand over that cup of pure wine, for in the elation it gives both rich and beggar are drunk.

5. Purify the heart with the cup of divine unity (tevhid); let nothing other than God ever remain in the heart.

6. O musician, for God's sake make your instrument speak; let a sound rise from the melody of the lovers, that is, from the Uşşak mode.

7. O Fazlî, you are its sustenance (its reason for living); what endures is your face, and everything apart from it is perishable. (The couplet is obscure and can be read in two ways: if the address is directed to God, it says "You are Fazlî's sustenance; only Your face endures"; if the poet is addressing himself, the first line comes closer to the sense "O Fazlî, your sustenance comes from Him". The word "kim" in the line is absent from the manuscript; Özkat added it to complete the metre.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a ghazal (gazel) of seven couplets (beyit), written in the "fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün" pattern of the remel metre of aruz (quantitative metre). It has no redif (refrain word); the rhyme is built on the "-dā" sound of the words "fedā, zedā, cüdā, gedā, Ḫudā, ṣadā, ‘adā", and Özkat counts this ghazal among those with rich rhyme. The word "el-hüdā" in the first line of the opening couplet also fits the same sound. The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last couplet. The ghazal is found in the Fazlî section of the miscellany in the Hazine collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library (fol. 216b). To whom and when it was written is not known.

Only the first line of the ghazal is in Arabic and is given in the edition in Arabic script; the rest is Turkish. Özkat does not count this poem among the mülemma ghazals, but cites its Arabic line as an example of the Arabic expressions Fazlî set into his poems. He gives the meaning of the line in a footnote but not its reading. The Arabic-script line in the original text is Özkat's text; the reading in Latin script beneath it is ours. The word "[kim]" in the last couplet is Özkat's addition; in the manuscript the line runs "İy Fażlī sensin anuñ dirlügi", and Özkat notes that in this form the metre falls short.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal opens like a cupbearer's ghazal, but from the start it turns the wine into a wine of divine unity. In the first line the cup requested of the cupbearer is the "cup of guidance"; in the fifth couplet this cup is explicitly named "cām-ı tevḥīd" (the cup of divine unity). In the couplets between, the familiar elements of tavern poetry are used: drunkenness, driving away sorrow, rich and beggar meeting in the same elation; at the end of the poem it becomes clear that all of these point to the love of God. In divan poetry wine, cup and cupbearer are often read together with such Sufi meanings.

The Arabic first line recalls the famous line that opens the first ghazal of the divan of Hâfız of Shiraz: "Elā yā eyyühe’s-sāḳī edir ke’sen ve nāvilhā" (O cupbearer, pass round a cup and hand it over). Fazlî's line repeats most of this line with the words "eyyühe’s-sāḳī edir ke’se", while changing its end to "el-hüdā" and thereby loading the cup with the meaning of guidance; this connection is our observation. The translation "Cupbearer, pass round the cup and hand it to me too" that Özkat gives in the footnote also fits the meaning of Hâfız's line more than that of Fazlî's.

The ghazal contains small plays that tie sound and sense together. In the second couplet the words "ġamzede" (grieved) and "ġam-zedā" (sorrow-dispelling) are built from almost the same sounds and express each other's opposite; this paronomasia (cinas) is our observation. Three couplets in a row begin with "Ṣun beru" (hand it over) and turn the call to the cupbearer into an insistent entreaty. The phrase "naġme-i ‘uşşāḳ" in the sixth couplet means both the melody of the lovers and the Uşşak mode of Turkish music; this double entendre (tevriye) is also our interpretation.

The line "Vechüñ el-bāḳī ve fānī mā-‘adā" in the last couplet recalls verses 26 and 27 of the sura al-Rahmân in the Qur'an, meaning "everything on earth is perishing, and only the face of your Lord endures"; this allusion is our observation. The ghazal thus opens with the cup of guidance and closes by saying that everything other than God is perishable. Özkat illustrates the idiom "can feda etmek" (to sacrifice one's life) among the idioms in Fazlî's poems with the first couplet of this ghazal.

Bibliography

Online sources