Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilün

Ey benim ṭıfl-ı nev-āmūz u nāz u ānım
V’ey benim ġonce-i nev-reste-i nev-ḫandānım
Gel eliñden ṭutayım yabca-be-yabca cānım
Seni lālāñ gibice gezdireyim sulṭānım
Ṭurma ḳız gibi serā-perde-i ‘iṣmetde yeter
Gez gözüñ göñlüñ açılsun nitekim ġonce-i ter
Peder ü māderiñizden alalım iẕn-i şerīf
Gidelim iskeleye ṭoġru be-eṭvār-ı ẓarīf
İkimiz çifte ḳayıḳa binelim bī-teklīf
İdelim ‘azm-i temāşā-yı çemenzār-ı laṭīf
Ya Beşikṭaşa ya Ḳandīlliye yāḫod Bebeke
Ṭıfl-ı nāzım yine reşk itdürelim gel felege
Ḳuralım gülşene çarḫī siniyi bī-pervā
Dizelim cāmları kevkeb-i raḫşānāsā
Ḳorḳma al iç buña saḳızlı ṣu dirler paşa
Diyerek içireyim aldayup āb-ı ḥamrā
Süzilüp çeşm-i siyeh-mestiñ ola ḫūn-maḫlūṭ
Nigehiñ kec-külehiñ süḫanıñ nā-merbūṭ
Gāh mestāne kelām-ile şaḳırdım ṣoḥbet
Gāh ‘itāb-ı ġażab-ālūde-i nāz u naḫvet
Gelmesün rūḥ-ı laṭīfiñe a cānım s̱ıḳlet
Sīneñi aç ḳuşaġıñ çöz biraz bul ḫiffet
Vir ḳuluñ ṣaḳlasun ol ḫancer-i ser-tīziñizi
Sell-i seyf itme amān ġamze-i ḫūn-rīziñiz
Gel eliñden ṭutayım yabca-be-yabca gel gel
İdelim şöyle biraz seyr-i yem-i pür-ṣayḳal
Saña Vāżıḥ oḳusun şarḳī-i nā-yāb-ı bedel
Sen su’āl eyle Nedīmiñ mi diyü işbu ġazel
Saña ne seyr ü ṣafā itdirecekdir bendeñ
Āh ne cünbiş idecekdir ki o kāfir bendeñ

In English

1. O my young, coy and charming child just beginning to learn; O my rosebud newly sprung, newly breaking into a smile. Come, let me take your hand, gently, gently, my dear; let me take you about like your lala (a child's tutor and attendant), my sultan. Stay no longer behind the curtain of modesty like a girl; go about, let your eyes and heart open, as a fresh rosebud opens.

2. Let us take honoured leave from your mother and father; let us go towards the landing stage with graceful manners. Let the two of us board a two-pair-oared caique without ceremony; let us go to view the lovely meadow. To Beşiktaş, or to Kandilli, or else to Bebek; come, my coy child, let us make the heavens envious again.

3. Let us set the round tray in the rose garden without a care; let us line up the cups like shining stars. Saying "Don't be afraid, take it and drink, they call this mastic water, pasha", let me coax you into drinking the red water (wine). Let your drunken black eyes grow languid and shot with blood; let your glance, your tilted cap and your words lose their hold on one another.

4. Now let us chatter merrily in drunken talk; now you may scold in anger mixed with coyness and pride. Let no heaviness come upon your delicate soul, my dear; open your breast, loosen your sash, be a little lighter. Give your servant that sharp-pointed dagger of yours to keep; mercy, do not draw the sword of your blood-shedding glance.

5. Come, let me take your hand, gently, gently, come, come; let us gaze a while at the mirror-bright sea. Let Vâzıh sing you a song without equal; and you ask, "Is this ghazal by Nedîm?" What pleasure and delight this servant of yours will give you; ah, what revelry that rascal servant of yours will make.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is the third piece in the musammat section of the Dîvânçe and consists of five stanzas in the remel pattern "fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün". Each stanza has six lines: the first four rhyme with one another, and the last two close the stanza with a rhyme of their own (aaaabb, ccccdd …). Because the last two lines change in every stanza, the poem has no recurring refrain. Babaarslan defines it as a terkîb-bend (a stanzaic poem whose linking couplet changes from stanza to stanza) and considers Topal's and Özçakmak's description of it as a müseddes (six-line stanza poem) a mistake; Özçakmak, for her part, mentions it as the first of the three müseddes in the Dîvânçe, a poem "on an outing with the beloved". Since six lines per stanza recall the müseddes form, while a linking couplet that changes from stanza to stanza recalls the structure of the terkîb-bend, both names have some ground. Babaarslan notes that the metre is faulty in the last line of the third stanza.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem is an invitation from beginning to end. The poet asks the beloved, whom he addresses as "ṭıfl" (child, youth), to obtain leave from the family and come on an outing along the Bosphorus. Casting himself as the beloved's "lala", the tutor who takes children out, is a familiar expression of devotion to the young beloved in divan poetry. The stanzas follow the course of an outing: leave, landing stage, caique, Beşiktaş, Kandilli or Bebek, a spread laid on the meadow, drink, conversation and gazing at the sea. The rosebud image appears twice in the first stanza: the beloved is a newly opening bud, and the outing will open the beloved's eyes and heart as a bud opens.

The words "sakızlı ṣu" (mastic water) and "āb-ı ḥamrā" (red water) in the third stanza name drink in veiled terms. In Vâzıh's Ghazal 7, too, the wine offered to the beloved is called "bu Sāḳız hediyyesidir" (this is a gift of Chios); the repetition of the scene of coaxing the beloved to drink in two poems is notable. The dagger and the sword of the glance in the fourth stanza are common metaphors likening the beloved's look to a weapon. In the last stanza the poet gives his own name and wants the beloved to ask "Is this ghazal by Nedîm?" The question openly says that Vâzıh took Nedîm as his model; Babaarslan also describes him as a "Nedîm muakkibi", a poet following in Nedîm's footsteps. The poem's last word "bendeñ" (your servant) also calls to mind the word "bend" (stanza) in a poem that ends a stanza with it; this second reading is our conjecture.

Historical Context

The places in the poem are on the shores of the Bosphorus in Istanbul. Babaarslan writes that some time after his father's death Vâzıh went to Istanbul for higher studies; Özçakmak also states that the poet was studying in Istanbul in 1200 (1786). Whether the poem was written during these Istanbul years or after his return to Amasya, from memory and imagination, is unknown. Caique outings, spreads laid in Bosphorus gardens and song are familiar scenes of the eighteenth-century world of pleasure associated with Nedîm. The same Istanbul atmosphere appears in Vâzıh's Musammat 4 on the Süleymaniye. For the poet's life see the page Kara Müftîzâde Mustafa Vâzıh.

Bibliography

Academic studies

  • Giyasi Babaarslan, "Amasyalı Vâzıh ve Dîvânçesi", Akademik Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, 5(4), 2021, pp. 1922-1984 (text of the poem: p. 1970; Mustafa Vâzıh, Dîvânçe, Ankara University, Department of Manuscripts, Mustafa Con A 495/III, fols. 71a-71b). https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/akaded/article/993264
  • Giyasi Babaarslan, "Amasyalı Vâzıh ve Dîvânçesi", Akademik Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, 5(4), 2021, pp. 1924-1929 (life, Nedîm's influence and description of the musammats). https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/akaded/article/993264
  • Fatma Özçakmak, "Mustafa Vâzıh Efendi ve Dîvânçe'si", Kesit Akademi Dergisi, 7(26), 2021, pp. 255-278, pp. 266-268 and 274.

Online sources