Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: 11-syllable syllabic metre

‘Elâ gözlerine ḳurbân olduġum
Hep seniň derdiňe yanar aġlarım
Güllere ‘arż idem ‘arż-ı ḥâlimi
Elleriň yanında görür aġlarım

In English

1. You whose hazel eyes I would give my life for, I always burn with your sorrow and weep. I would lay my state before the roses; (but) I see them beside your hand, and weep.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a koşma. The koşma is the most common verse form of minstrel poetry; it is built of quatrains and usually sung in an eleven-syllable metre. The lines have a caesura after 6+5 or 4+4+3 syllables; the syllable count is ours. Because Hakverdioğlu's article publishes only the first verse unit of each poem in the cönk, we know only the first quatrain of this poem. The first and third lines, "olduġum / ḥâlimi", are free; the second and fourth form a half-rhyme in "yanar / görür", with "aġlarım" as the refrain. To whom and on what occasion the poem was composed is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The quatrain opens with one of the best-known forms of address in folk poetry, "ela gözlerine kurban olduğum" (you whose hazel eyes I would die for). This formula appears in the poems of many minstrels and is not enough on its own to distinguish one poet. The refrain "ağlarım" (I weep) carries the tone of burning and weeping often found in the songs attributed to Kerem. The third and fourth lines are more obscure: the lover wants to tell his sorrow to the roses, but weeps when he sees the roses beside the beloved's "el", hand. The line may suggest a scene in which the rose is held in the beloved's hand, or, with the word "eller", strangers, other people; in everyday Turkish "eller" also means other folk, strangers. In the second reading the lover weeps on seeing the rose (the beloved) beside strangers.

Historical Context

The poem is recorded under the pen name "Kerem" in the Merzifon Cönkü introduced by Metin Hakverdioğlu in 2019. This is the only poem with the pen name Kerem in the cönk. The name Kerem recalls above all Âşık Kerem, hero of the story of Kerem and Aslı; verse pieces from this story are known to have been frequently recorded in cönks. The article gives no information about the poet; the poet's identity and the century in which he lived have not been determined. Since the cönk is thought to have been compiled in Merzifon within the literary circle of Eyüb Sabrî, the poet may have been one read or living in that circle. For details, see the page on Kerem. The poem is on page 106 of the cönk and page 551 of the article; its full text is in the cönk itself and has not been published to date.

Bibliography

Online sources