Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün Mefā‘īlün

Görüp dil bir ṣaçı Leylī nigāruñ oldı meyyāli
‘Aceb Mecnūn’ı olmışdur anuñ bilsem n’ola ḥāli
Eger kimdür dir iseñ ol yüzi gül ruḫleri āli
Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī
Cihānda bī-nihāyetdür egerçi dilber-i zībā
Ḳamusı gül-sitān-ı ḥüsn içinde bir gül-i ra‘nā
İdüp tercīḥ o māhı cümlesinden didiler [baña]
Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī
Daḫı bir ġoncedür tāze cihān bāġında ol dilber
Ḳadi serv ü yañaġı gül ruḫı lāle gözi ‘abher
Bulınmaz arasañ cümle cihānı bir aña beñzer
Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī
Baña ṭa‘n itme olursam cemāli nūrına nāẓır
Muḥammed ümmetisin ṣūfiyā Allah’ı gör ḥāżır
Müselmān ola v’Allahi cemālini gören kāfir
Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī
Ḳadi her dilberüñ gerçi ḳıyāmetdür ‘alāmetdür
Velīkin ol ṣaçı maḥşer ṣanem ġāyet ḳıyāmetdür
Cihān dilberleri içre ol iy Fażlī bir āfetdür
Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī

In English

1. The heart saw a beauty whose hair is like Leyla and fell in love with him; I wonder, if it has become his Mecnun, what its state will be. If you ask who he is: that rose-faced one with red cheeks, the chief of the fair and of the heart-stealers, lofty Ali Bâlî. ("A‘lā", lofty, and the name "‘Alī" make a play on sound.)

2. True, the adorned beauties of the world are countless, and each of them is a lovely rose in the rose garden of beauty; but they preferred that moon to them all and said to me: the chief of the fair and of the heart-stealers, lofty Ali Bâlî.

3. That beauty is a still fresh bud in the garden of the world; his stature is a cypress, his cheek a rose, his face a tulip, his eye a narcissus; if you searched the whole world, you would not find one like him. The chief of the fair and of the heart-stealers, lofty Ali Bâlî.

4. Do not reproach me if I become one who gazes on the light of his face; O Sufi, you are of the community of Muhammad, know God to be present; by God, the unbeliever who sees his beauty becomes a Muslim. The chief of the fair and of the heart-stealers, lofty Ali Bâlî.

5. True, the stature of every beauty is a sign of the Resurrection; but that idol whose hair is the gathering of the Last Day is the very Resurrection. O Fazlî, among the beauties of the world he is a calamity. The chief of the fair and of the heart-stealers, lofty Ali Bâlî.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a murabba (quatrain stanza poem) of five stanzas. The first three lines of each stanza rhyme among themselves; the fourth is repeated in every stanza as the refrain "Güzeller dil-rübālar serveri a‘lā ‘Alī Bālī". In the first stanza the refrain also shares the rhyme "-āli" (meyyāli, ḥāli, āli, Bālī). The rhymes of the other stanzas are "-ā", "-er", "-ır" and "-etdür". The metre is the "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün" pattern of the hezec family. The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last stanza. "[baña]" in the second stanza is a completion made in the edition.

Özkat publishes the poem as the thirteenth musammat of the divan. The text is found only in the Fazlî divan section (fol. 224a) of the miscellany in the Hazine collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library. According to Özkat's description, this part of the miscellany was copied in 1149 (1736) and later bound in; it bears the note "left unfinished".

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Among the murabbas of praise Fazlî wrote for beauties famous in his time, Özkat also counts this poem written for Alî Bâlî. The refrain ties the beauty's name to the praise through a play on sound: the word "a‘lā" (loftiest) and the name "‘Alī" come from the same root and are used side by side. In the first stanza there is an allusion to the story of Leyla and Mecnun: the beauty's hair is likened to Leyla, and the heart that sees it to Mecnun. In the second stanza the poet says through the mouths of others that this "moon" has been chosen from among the countless beauties of the world; the praise is thus presented as a shared opinion.

The third stanza gathers together the flower comparisons used in the description of the beloved in divan poetry: the stature is a cypress, the cheek a rose, the face a tulip, the eye a narcissus ("‘abher" is a name of the narcissus flower). This is an example of enumeration that draws the beauty's portrait from head to foot through a list of comparisons. In the fourth stanza the poet speaks against the ascetic, here the "Sufi": he asks him not to reproach him for gazing at the beauty's face, for even the unbeliever who sees his beauty becomes a Muslim. This rests on the view that earthly beauty is a reflection of divine beauty. The motif of the Resurrection is worked out in the last stanza: the stature of every beauty is a sign of the Resurrection, but this beauty, whose hair is the "gathering of the Last Day", is the Resurrection itself. The link of the tall stature with the Resurrection and of the scattered hair with the crowd of the gathering rests also on the sense of the word "ḳıyāmet" as "rising up"; the word's everyday sense of "exceedingly beautiful, one who stirs up turmoil" is also felt in the line. The language of the poem is plain, and its comparisons are taken from the familiar stock of the tradition.

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, pp. 240-241, musammat no. 13 (Topkapı Palace Museum Library, Hazine, fol. 224a); also pp. 57-58 (on the murabbas) and pp. 119-120 (description of the manuscripts), https://katalog.marmara.edu.tr/veriler/yordambt/cokluortam/5E/T0051713.pdf.

Online sources