Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ūlü Fā‘ilātü Mefā‘īlü Fā‘ilün

İy çarḫ-ı bī-amān yine ḳılduñ ġarīb kār
Tīġ-ı sitemle sīneleri eyledüñ figār
Urduñ ġam ile baġrumuz[a] dāġ-ı ḥasreti
Nīrān-ı fitneden yine ṣalduñ ḫūbāna nār
Evvel naẓarda ‘arża ḳılup ṣūret-i vefā
Rūy-ı cefāyı eyledüñ āḫirde āşikār
Her kim ki aldanup saña senden vefā umar
İy bī-vefā cefā ile eylersin anı zār
Nūş-ı beḳā umanlara nīş-i fenā ṣunup
Āb-ı ḥayātı ḳahruñ ider cāna zehr-i mār
Ḳanı o şeh ki devlet ü iḳbāl ü ḳadr ile
Olmışdı cümle ḫāṣ ile ‘ām içre nām-dār
Kāḫ-ı sürūr iken yirini ḫāk-ı ġam ḳılup
Ḳılduñ vücūd-ı pākını ḳahr ile ḫāk-sār
Ol kān-ı luṭf u ma‘den-i ṣāḥib-ṣafā ḳanı
A‘nī yegāne Ḥażret-i Şeh Muṣṭafā ḳanı
Bir şāh-idi ki devlet ü ḳadr ile bī-gümān
Olmışdı nām-ı nīki cihān içre dāstān
Ḳahr ile ḫavf-ı tīġı ḳılup Rüstem’i zebūn
Ḳahrından ister idi anuñ Ḳahramān amān
Nāmı ṭutup cihānı bütün ‘adl ü dād ile
Cāndan muḥibbi olmış idi pīrle vü cüvān
Derdā ki ol maḥabbet olup bā‘is̱-i helāk
Ṣaldı o şāhı varṭa-i itlāfa rāygān
Bāzū-yı devlet üzre ‘aceb şāh-bāzdı
Āl ile dāma düşdi ḳazā ile nā-gehān
Şāh-ı cihāna geçdi ‘adū eyleyüp ġaraż
Ey dil ne çāre çün bu imiş emr-i Müste‘ān
Ṣabr eyle ḳudretüñ yoġ ise ṣabra dāyimā
Tā ḥaşr olınca derd ile ḳıl nāle vü fiġān
Ḳan aġla tīġ-ı ḥasret ile sīne çāk olup
Yan derd ile ḳıyāmete dek derd-nāk olup
Derdā vü ḥasretā vü dirīġā hezār āh
Ḳıydı o şāha ẓulm ile bu rūz-gār āh
Aġlar bu mātem ile cihān ḫalḳı zār u zār
Eyler bu ḥasret ile ṣiġār u kibār āh
Yansun belā vü ḥasret ile cümle ṭaġ u ṭaş
Ḳılsun ‘anā vü derd ile dār [u] diyār āh
Mü’min olan yaḳar bu muṣibetle baġrını
Kāfir de eylesün bu işe ṣad hezār āh
Bu mātem ile pīr ü cüvān nāleler ḳılup
Ṭoldı enīn ü şīven ile her kenār āh
Ṭaş olsa bu firāḳa ṭaşa baġrı doymaya
Kimdür bu demde ḳılmaya leyl ü nehār āh
Her gice Fażliyā ġam ile baġrumuz yaḳup
Her gün firāḳ ile ḳılalum āşikār āh
Derd ü firāḳ ile geçirüp rūz-gārumuz
Çıḳsun [ki] yiridür felege āh u zārumuz

In English

I-1. O merciless heaven, once again you have done a strange deed; with the sword of cruelty you have wounded our breasts.

I-2. With grief you have branded our hearts with the mark of longing; from the fires of sedition you have once again cast fire upon the fair ones.

I-3. At first sight you showed the face of fidelity; in the end you revealed the face of cruelty.

I-4. Whoever is deceived by you and hopes for fidelity from you, O faithless one, you make him wail with cruelty.

I-5. To those who hope for the honey of everlasting life you offer the sting of mortality; your wrath turns even the water of life into snake's poison for the soul.

I-6. Where is that king who, by his fortune, prosperity and rank, had become renowned among the elite and the common people alike?

I-7. His place was a palace of joy, yet you turned it into the dust of grief; in your wrath you laid his pure being low in the dust.

I-8. Where is that mine of kindness, that source of a man of purity? I mean, where is His Highness, the peerless King Mustafa?

II-1. He was a king whose good name, by his fortune and rank, had without doubt become a legend in the world.

II-2. The fear of his sword left Rüstem helpless before his wrath, and even Kahraman begged mercy from his anger. (Rüstem and Kahraman are famous champions of the Persian epics.)

II-3. His name had taken the whole world through justice and equity, and old and young alike had come to love him with all their soul.

II-4. Alas, that love became the cause of his ruin and cast that king, for nothing, into the abyss of destruction.

II-5. What a wondrous royal falcon he was upon the wrist of fortune; by a trick, as fate would have it, he suddenly fell into the snare.

II-6. The enemy, acting with ill intent, had his way with the king of the world. O heart, what remedy is there, since this was the command of God, whose help is sought?

II-7. If you have the strength for patience, be patient always; until the Day of Judgement moan and lament in your grief.

II-8. Weep blood, your breast torn open by the sword of longing; burn with grief, grieving until the Day of Judgement.

III-1. Alas, what longing, what pity, a thousand sighs; this fate has slain that king with injustice, ah.

III-2. The people of the world weep and wail at this mourning; young and old sigh with this longing.

III-3. Let all the mountains and stones burn with calamity and longing; let house and homeland sigh with toil and grief.

III-4. Whoever is a believer burns his heart with this calamity; let even the infidel sigh a hundred thousand times at this deed.

III-5. Old and young alike lamented with this mourning; every corner was filled with moaning and wailing, ah.

III-6. Even a stone, at this parting, could not have its fill of beating its breast against stones; who is there who would not sigh night and day at such a moment? (The first line is obscure; it can also be read as "even a heart of stone could not bear this parting".)

III-7. O Fazlî, let us burn our hearts with grief every night and sigh openly with the pain of parting every day.

III-8. Since we pass our days in grief and parting, it is fitting that our sighs and wails should rise to heaven.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is an elegy (mersiye) in the form of a terkib-bend of three stanzas. The terkib-bend is a verse form in which stanzas written in the same metre and each rhymed like a ghazal are linked by a "linking couplet" (vasıta beyti) whose rhyme changes in every stanza. Here each stanza consists of seven couplets (beyit) and a linking couplet, eight couplets in all; Özkat, too, states that the stanzas contain eight couplets each. The rhyme of the first stanza is "-ār" (kār, figār, nār), that of the second "-ān" (gümān, dāstān, amān), and that of the third the sound "-ār" (hezār, rūz-gār, kibār) with the redif (refrain word) "āh". The linking couplets close the stanzas with the refrains "ḳanı", "olup" and "-umuz". The metre is "mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātü mefā‘īlü fā‘ilün" of the muzari family. The pen name (mahlas) appears in the third stanza in the form "Fażliyā".

Mustafa Özkat published this elegy as the 37th musammat of the divan from the miscellany Âşir Efendi 314 in the Süleymaniye Library (fols. 67b-68a). The first 66 folios of the same miscellany contain a copy of Gül ü Bülbül made in 960; the elegy follows immediately after this copy. In the fifth couplet of the first stanza Özkat corrected the manuscript's "āb-ı ḥayvānı" to "āb-ı ḥayātı" for the sake of the metre. The additions in square brackets are also Özkat's emendations for the metre.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Özkat summarizes the plan of the elegy as follows: in the first stanza the poet reproaches heaven (felek) and describes its faithlessness, in the second he praises Şehzade Mustafa, and in the third he weeps while reproaching those who slew him. The first stanza is wholly an address to heaven. Heaven is a deceiver who first shows "ṣūret-i vefā", the face of fidelity, and in the end reveals "rūy-ı cefā", the face of cruelty; the contrasts of "nūş-ı beḳā" (the honey of everlasting life) and "nīş-i fenā" (the sting of mortality), of "āb-ı ḥayāt" (the water of life) and "zehr-i mār" (snake's poison), express this deception through antithesis (tezat). The stanza closes with the linking couplet that asks "Ḳanı", "where is he?", and names the prince for the first time.

The second stanza is a eulogy, but the cause of death is set within the praise. The prince's justice had taken the world and old and young loved him; the line "Derdā ki ol maḥabbet olup bā‘is̱-i helāk" says that this love led to his death. The same idea appears in Fazlî's murabba elegy. The image of the falcon and the snare is also common to the two elegies: Mustafa is a falcon standing on "bāzū-yı devlet", the wrist of fortune, who has fallen into the snare through an "āl", a trick. Rüstem and Kahraman, named in the second couplet, are champions of the Persian epic tradition, and describe the prince's valour by a hyperbolic simile (teşbih). One may ask whether the name Rüstem also called to mind Grand Vizier Rüstem Pasha, who was held to have had a share in the prince's death; but no such interpretation of the couplet has been made in the sources.

The sixth couplet carries another element common to the two elegies: "Şāh-ı cihāna geçdi ‘adū eyleyüp ġaraż", the enemy, acting with ill intent, had his way with the king of the world. Again the blame is laid on those who influenced the padishah; and with the following words "bu imiş emr-i Müste‘ān" (this was the command of God) the event is tied to destiny, and the poet counsels himself to patience. The third stanza, with its redif "āh", is a lament from beginning to end. Hyperboles such as the burning of mountains and stones and even the infidel's sighing recall similar expressions in the seventh stanza of the murabba elegy.

Historical Context

When Şehzade Mustafa was killed in October 1553, Fazlî had been his divan secretary in Amasya for ten years. Özkat thinks that the caution arising from the prince's death by execution may have played a part in the small number of stanzas in this elegy. Indeed in this text those responsible for the injustice are named only by general terms such as "felek" (heaven) and "‘adū" (the enemy), and in the end the event is referred to God's decree.

The sources do not fully agree on the number of elegies Fazlî wrote for Şehzade Mustafa. The TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi says that Fazlî wrote "an elegy" for Mustafa. Maruf Çakır states that among the sixteen identified elegies for Mustafa, Nisâyî is the only poet who wrote two. Özkat's compilation, however, contains two elegies for Mustafa by Fazlî: this terkib-bend and the eleven-stanza murabba. Özkat also reports that the last four stanzas of the seven-stanza terkib-bend Fazlî wrote for Şehzade Mehmed were mistakenly published by Mehmed Çavuşoğlu among the elegies for Şehzade Mustafa; this is why Fazlî's elegies for the two princes have at times been confused.

Bibliography

Academic studies

Online sources