Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefā‘ilün Fe‘ilātün Mefā‘ilün Fe‘ilün

Nedür bu ẕevḳ u ṣafā vü nedür bu ḥaẓẓ u ḥużūr
Bu ‘ıyşı var ise bāḳī ṣanursın iy maġrūr
Niçe dürişesin itmege ḳaṣruñı a‘lā
Añ ol zemānı ki bir gün yirüñ olısar gūr
Ne fā’ide çü degül üstüvār ḫāne-i ‘ömr
Ṭutam ki ḳaṣruña göre cinānda ola ḳuṣūr
Cihānda Ka‘be-i dil yapmasına sa‘y eyle
Ḫalīl-i Ḥaḳ olasın cānuñ ola tā mesrūr
Serāy-ı raḥmete mālik ide seni Mevlā
Bugün ki ḳaṣr-ı ‘ibādātı idesin ma‘mūr
Çerāġ yaḳmaġa sa‘y eyle dār-ı dünyāda
Dilerseñ eylemeye ḳabrüñi Ḫudā deycūr
Fütūḥ-ı milket-i ‘afve iresin eyler iseñ
Günāh leşkerini tevbe tīġiyle maḳhūr
Degül mi ‘ayb ki il ‘aybına naẓar idesin
Hezār ‘aybuñı Settār ide senüñ mestūr
Güzellerüñ niçe bir vaṣf-ı ḫaṭṭın eyleyesin
Añ ol zemānı ki bir gün üşiser aġzuña mūr
Güzel ne fā’ide eyler saña o dem ‘acebā
Elüñde ḳalmaya ferr ü gözüñde ḳalmaya nūr
Ölmelü ḫastesisin gördügüñ perī-rūnuñ
Meger ki sāḥir-i nefs eyledi seni mesḥūr
Gedālıġ ile ġanī ol Ḫıṭā durur alma
Eger ki Çīn’i saña virse ser-te-ser faġfūr
Revā mı ġaflet ile sen uyursın iy ādem
Gice ṣabāḥa degin ẕikr ider vuḥūş u ṭuyūr
Getürdi taḫtuñı yil ṭutalum Süleymān-vār
Ne fā’ide olıcaḳ şāh-ı merge sen me’mūr
Çü ‘āḳıbet kefen olur libāsı her kişinüñ
‘Abā ile ola mı farḳ-ı cāme-i semmūr
Saña göñül vireler baş yüz üzre yirüñ ola
Olursa zülf-i ṣanem gibi ḫāṭıruñ meksūr
Ne ola ḥāl ‘aceb āḫiretde dimeyesin
Ḳanı ‘ibādet-i Mevlā nedür bu fısḳ u fücūr
Meger ki geçmez ola ḫāṭıruñdan iy ġāfil
Aḳar ṣu gibi ider ‘ömr ü hem zemāne mürūr
Ġurūr eyleme var ḥālüñe ṣanup gerçek
Bir iki gün yüzüñe gülse dehr virse ġurūr
Hevāya yeltenüben yelmedür ki her laḥẓa
Ḳoparasın çü ṣabā ‘ālem içre gird-i fütūr
Eger ki mühre-i ẕikr ile ṣāf idesin ola
Ḫuṭūṭ-ı raḥmet ile ṣafḥa-i dilüñ mesṭūr
Günāh eylemedür her zemān işüñ Fażlī
Meger ki ḫāṭıra itmez ‘aẓāb-ı nār-ı ḫuṭūr
Resūl sünnetini kendüzüñe farż eyle
Ki cennet ola mekānuñ şarābuñ ola ṭahūr

In English

1. What is this joy and pleasure, what is this delight and ease; O proud one, do you think this life will last?

2. How much longer will you strive to raise your palace high? Remember the time when one day your place will be the grave.

3. What use is it, since the house of life is not firm? Suppose that in paradise too you have palaces to match your palace. (The word "ḳuṣūr" in the line means both "palaces" and "faults".)

4. Strive in this world to build the Kaaba of the heart, so that like Abraham you may become the Friend of God and your soul may rejoice. (Abraham is believed to have built the Kaaba; his epithet is Halilullah, the Friend of God.)

5. If today you make the palace of worship prosperous, the Lord will make you master of the palace of mercy.

6. If you wish God not to make your grave dark, strive to light a lamp in the abode of this world.

7. If you overcome the army of sin with the sword of repentance, you will attain the conquest of the realm of forgiveness.

8. While God, who covers faults, covers a thousand faults of yours, is it not a fault to look at the faults of others?

9. How much longer will you describe the down on the cheeks of the fair? Remember the time when one day the ants will swarm into your mouth. (In divan poetry the fine down on the beloved's cheek is likened to a line of ants; the poet turns this image into the ants of the grave.)

10. At that moment, when no strength will remain in your hand and no light in your eye, what use will a beauty be to you?

11. You are sick unto death for the fairy-faced one you saw; or has the sorcerer of the self bewitched you?

12. Be rich through begging; even if the emperor of China gave you all China, do not take it, it is an error. ("Ḫıṭā" is both the name of northern China and the word for "error"; "faġfūr" is the title of the emperor of China.)

13. O man, is it fitting that you sleep in heedlessness, while the wild beasts and the birds make remembrance of God all night until morning?

14. Suppose the wind carried your throne as it carried Solomon's; what use is it once you are given over to the king of death? (Solomon's throne is believed to have been carried by the wind.)

15. Since in the end everyone's garment is the shroud, is there any difference between a coarse cloak and a sable fur?

16. If your heart is broken like the curl of the beloved, people will give you their hearts and your place will be upon their heads and eyes.

17. Will you not say, "How will it be with me in the hereafter? Where is the worship of the Lord, and what is this sin and depravity?"

18. O heedless one, does it not cross your mind that life and time pass away like running water?

19. If the world smiles on you for a day or two and makes you proud, do not take it for real and grow proud of your state.

20. To be carried away by desire and raise, like the morning breeze, the dust of slackness in the world every moment, is to run in vain.

21. If you polish your heart with the burnisher of remembrance, the page of your heart will be written with the lines of mercy. (The mühre is a polished stone used to burnish paper.)

22. Fazlî, your business at all times is sinning; or does the torment of the fire of hell never cross your mind?

23. Make the custom (sunna) of the Prophet a duty upon yourself, so that your abode may be paradise and your wine the pure wine of paradise.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a kaside (qasida) of twenty-three couplets (beyit). The metre is the "mefā‘ilün fe‘ilātün mefā‘ilün fe‘ilün" pattern of the müctes family; the rhyme is the sound "-ūr": ḥużūr, maġrūr, gūr, ḳuṣūr, mesrūr, ma‘mūr and the same sound in the following couplets. The pen name (mahlas) appears in couplet 22. Its title is "Ḳaṣīde-i Fażlī fi'l-mev‘iẓeti ve'n-naṣīḥati", a kaside on admonition and counsel. Mustafa Özkat defines it as a didactic and mystical kaside of the counsel type. The kaside has no section of praise; from beginning to end the poet gives counsel to the human being he addresses as "iy maġrūr" (O proud one), "iy ġāfil" (O heedless one) and "iy ādem" (O man). To whom and when it was written is not known.

Özkat publishes the kaside from miscellany no. 1966 of the Revan collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library (fol. 138b); no other copy of the poem is known. Özkat points out some problems of reading in his footnotes: "tīġiyle" in the seventh couplet suits the sense, but the metre requires the form "tīġ-ile"; "semmūr" in couplet 15 is miswritten in the manuscript; "gülse" in couplet 19 is vocalised in the manuscript so as to be read "gelse".

Meaning and Figures of Speech

According to Özkat's summary, this kaside dwells on the transience of the world and counsels winning hearts, worshipping, keeping away from sin and not looking at the faults of others. The kaside is built on the contrast between worldly goods and death and works out this contrast through a succession of antitheses: the lofty palace and the grave, the house of life and the palace in paradise, Solomon's throne and the king of death, the coarse cloak and the sable fur. Couplet 15 is the plainest expression of this idea: since everyone's last garment is the shroud, no difference remains between the rich man's fur and the poor man's cloak.

The poet strengthens his counsel by reversing well-known images of divan poetry. In the ninth couplet the down on the beloved's cheek, the "ḫaṭ", turns into the ants swarming into the mouth of the dead in the grave; the word "mūr" (ant) carries both the motif of beauty and the reality of death. In couplet 16 the beloved's curling lock becomes the image of the broken-hearted, that is, humble, person. The fourth couplet, with an allusion to Abraham, who built the Kaaba, counsels the building of a "Kaaba of the heart"; Özkat quotes this couplet and the second as examples of the poet's didactic mode. In couplet 18, Özkat notes, the proverb "Life passes like water" is carried into the poem.

The word "ḳuṣūr" in the third couplet is a double entendre (tevriye), meaning both "palaces", as the plural of "ḳaṣr", and "faults": even if you have palaces in paradise, if the house of life is rotten, those palaces turn into faults. In couplet 12 the word "Ḫıṭā", meaning both northern China and "error", repeats the same figure. In couplet 21 the heart is likened to a page burnished with the stone of remembrance and filled with the lines of mercy; this comparison comes from the professional world of a secretary who dealt with paper and writing.

Bibliography

Online sources