Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün Fe‘ūlün

Ikını ṣıḳını itmiş Riyāżī
Yine yüz zūr ile bir şi‘r peydā
Açılup göti çıḳınca beş on gün
Yemiş bir poḫ cihāna ṣıçmış ammā
Ṣıçayazmış sevincinden ziyāde
Aña ṣūret virüp bulınca ma‘nā
Yine göt giñligin idüp idermiş
Ḳoyup ortaya altın şimdi da‘vā
Ki her kim dirse ol şi‘re naẓīre
Vire bī-minnet ol altını aña
Ḳamu yārān olup üstine anuñ
Didiler herbiri bir şi‘r-i ġarrā
Denīler cümle andan yeg didiler
Cihān içre eger a‘lā vü ednā
Eger yeg diyene altın virürse
Ulaşdursın yürüsin diñ hümāma

In English

1. Riyâzî, grunting and straining, has once again produced a poem with a hundred efforts.

2. When after five or ten days his arse opened and the poem came out, he had eaten some crap, but he shat it over the whole world.

3. When he gave his poem a form and found a meaning for it, he nearly soiled himself from the excess of his joy.

4. Once again, with the looseness of his arse, that is, brazenly, he has now put gold in the middle and made a wager:

5. whoever writes a nazire (response poem) to that poem, he would give him that gold without grudging.

6. All the friends went at him, and each of them composed a brilliant poem.

7. High or low in the world, even the basest all said, "better than his".

8. If he is to give gold to whoever says "better", let him hand it over; tell that brave fellow to get on with it. (The second line of the couplet is obscure; "hümām" means a brave or generous man and may be addressed to Riyâzî in mockery here. This is a conjecture.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a kıt'a (fragment) of eight couplets (beyit); the second lines rhyme on the sound -ā (peydā, ammā, ma‘nā, da‘vā …), and Özkat counts this kıt'a as having full rhyme. The metre is "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün fe‘ūlün" of the hezec family. There is no pen name (mahlas). The kıt'a is found only in the Fazlî divan section of the miscellany in the Hazine collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library (fol. 250a). When it was written is unknown.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Özkat states that this kıt'a was written to satirize a poet named Riyâzî. The kıt'a is an example of hezl (ribald verse); it does not shy away from obscene words and describes the writing of poetry from beginning to end as a scene of defecation. Riyâzî produces his poem grunting and straining, labouring for days; what he brings out is "crap", but he spreads it over the whole world. The sense of the idiom "bok yemek" (to eat crap), namely to do something foolish and wrong, can also be felt in the couplet; this interpretation is our own. The second half of the satire describes a poetry contest: Riyâzî announces that he will give gold to whoever writes a nazire (response poem) to his poem, the friends in the gathering go at him together and each composes a poem, and even the basest of them say that they have written better than his. The last couplet completes the mockery by calling on him to keep his promise. The contrast between the "şi‘r-i ġarrā" (brilliant poem) of the sixth couplet and the way Riyâzî's poem is described is the basis of the satire.

Historical Context

Özkat does not say who the satirized Riyâzî was. Fazlî's teacher Üsküplü Riyâzî, from whom he learned Persian in his youth, also bore this name; but the source draws no connection between this teacher and the Riyâzî of the kıt'a, and there is no information that this kıt'a was written against him.

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. 382, kıt'a no. 17 (Topkapı Palace Museum Library, Hazine, fol. 250a); also pp. 15-16 (Üsküplü Riyâzî), p. 65 (on the kıt'as) and p. 69 (rhyme), https://katalog.marmara.edu.tr/veriler/yordambt/cokluortam/5E/T0051713.pdf.

Online sources