Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün
Neden olur ruḫuñda şol ḫaṭ-ı ‘anber-feşān peydā
Bu rūşendür ki olmış şem‘-i ḳudretde duḫān peydā
Meger siḥr oḳıdur ġamzeñ deler ‘āşıḳlaruñ baġrın
Ne ḳan ẓāhir olur andan ne zaḫmından nişān peydā
Temāşā eyle gülşende şerār-ı āh-ı bülbülden
Olur vaḳt-i seḥer şekl-i nihāl-i erġavān peydā
Lebüñ ‘aksi düşüpdür var-ısa ervāḥ-ı ‘uşşāḳa
Olur bezm-i cihānda iy ḳamer mihr-i revān peydā
Me‘ānī şi‘rine Fażlī uraldan pençe-i ḳudret
Senüñ kūh-sār-ı naẓmuñda olur bebr-i beyān peydā
In English
1. Why does this ambergris-scattering down appear on your cheek? It is plain that smoke has appeared on the candle of divine power.
2. Your glance, it seems, recites spells; it pierces the hearts of lovers, yet neither does blood appear from them nor any trace of the wound.
3. Behold in the rose garden the sparks of the nightingale's sigh: at dawn the shape of a Judas tree sapling appears (from them).
4. O moon, if the reflection of your lip has fallen upon the spirits of lovers, a flowing sun appears in the gathering of the world. (The phrase "mihr-i revān" can also be understood as "the sun of the soul".)
5. O Fazlî, ever since you struck the paw of power upon the poetry of meaning, the tiger of eloquence appears in the mountains of your verse.
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
The poem is a ghazal (gazel) of five couplets, written in the "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün" pattern of the hezec family of aruz (quantitative metre). The redif (refrain word) is "peydā" (appearing, brought forth); Özkat counts this ghazal among those with a Persian single-word redif. The rhyme is formed by the sound "-ān" in the words "‘anber-feşān, duḫān, nişān, erġavān, revān, beyān". The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last couplet. The ghazal is the twenty-ninth in Özkat's edition and does not appear in the miscellany in the Hazine collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library; the text rests on Pervâne Beg's anthology of response poems, Bağdat Köşkü 406 (fol. 35b). In establishing the text Özkat compares two sources: in Betül Gündoğdu's thesis on this anthology the ghazal has four couplets, the fourth couplet being absent there, and in the second line of the first couplet "dehān" is read for "duḫān"; in the volume of the series "Büyük Türk Klâsikleri" devoted to sixteenth-century divan verse the ghazal is published with five couplets. It is not known to whom or when it was written.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
The first couplet offers a poetic explanation for the down (ḫaṭ) appearing on the beloved's cheek. The cheek is a candle lit by the hand of divine power; the down is the smoke rising from this candle. The word "rūşen" means both "plain, evident" and "bright", and is tied to the image of the candle. The epithet "‘anber-feşān" (scattering ambergris) conveys at once the dark colour and the fragrance of the down. In the second couplet the glance is a sorcerer: it pierces the lover's heart but leaves behind neither blood nor the trace of a wound; the absence of the marks an arrow or sword would leave is taken as proof that the wound was opened by magic. In the third couplet the sparks scattered by the nightingale's sigh take the shape, at dawn, of a red-flowering Judas tree sapling; a comparison is drawn between the fire of the sigh and the colour of the Judas tree.
The last couplet is among the examples of what Fazlî says about his own poetry. According to Özkat, the poet states here that meaning masters his poems like a "paw of power", and describes "beyân", which is to say flawless power of expression, as a fierce beast, a "bebr" (tiger), living within his verse that is lofty as the peaks of mountains. The words "pençe" (paw), "kūh-sār" (mountains) and "bebr" form a congruence of images (tenasüp). There is also an echo between "şem‘-i ḳudret" (candle of power) in the first couplet and "pençe-i ḳudret" (paw of power) in the last; the ghazal opens and closes with the word power.
The Nazire Relation
According to Özkat, this ghazal was written as a nazire (response poem) to Tabîbî's ghazal whose opening couplet is "Çıḳup ḳaṣrından olsa ol meh-i nāmihribān peydā / Olur ṣankim güneşdür āsümāndan nāgehān peydā". Tabîbî's ghazal was answered by four ghazals: those of Fazlî, Selîkî, Mahvî and a poet whose identity is uncertain. Özkat names Tabîbî as Tabîbî of Plovdiv and gives his date of death as unknown. In Tabîbî's opening couplet the beloved appears like a sun rising suddenly in the sky; in Fazlî's ghazal what appears is the down on the beloved's face, the Judas tree and, in the last couplet, the poet's own power of expression.
Bibliography
Primary sources
- Haluk İpekten, Mustafa İsen, Turgut Karabey, Metin Akkuş (eds.), Başlangıcından Günümüze Kadar Büyük Türk Klâsikleri, vol. III ("XVI. Yüzyıl Dîvân Nazmı"), Istanbul 1986, p. 399 (as cited by Özkat).
Academic studies
- 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. 301, ghazal no. 29 (Topkapı Palace Museum Library, Bağdat Köşkü 406, fol. 35b); also p. 41 (his remarks on his own poetry), p. 69 (redifs), pp. 96 and 100 (response poems), https://katalog.marmara.edu.tr/veriler/yordambt/cokluortam/5E/T0051713.pdf.
- Betül Gündoğdu, Pervâne Beg Nazire Mecmuası (30a-67b): Transkripsiyonlu, Edisyon Kritikli Metin, unpublished MA thesis, Marmara University Institute of Turkic Studies, Istanbul 2002, p. 58 (as cited by Özkat). katalog.marmara.edu.tr
