Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eight-syllable syllabic metre

Dertli gönlümü deftere
Yazım neyleyim neyleyim
Ben söyledim yar tutmadı
Sözüm neyleyim neyleyim
O yar merhamet etmiyor
Sevdası serden gitmiyor
Kırık kollarım tutmuyor
Dizim neyleyim neyleyim
Kul Fakır’ım dost yoluna
Dost düşman çıktı seyrine
Mezarımı dost köyüne
Kazım neyleyim neyleyim

In English

1. If I wrote my aching heart in a ledger, what should I do, what should I do. I spoke, but my beloved did not heed my word; what should I do with my word, what should I do.

2. That beloved shows no mercy, the passion for that beloved does not leave my head. My broken arms will not hold; what should I do with my knees, what should I do.

3. I am Kul Fakır, I set out on the Friend's path. The second line can be read in two ways: friend and foe alike came out to watch my plight, or the one I took for a friend turned out a foe. If I dug my grave in the Friend's village, what should I do, what should I do.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The deyiş is a short semai or koşma of three quatrains in the eight-syllable syllabic metre. The last line of each quatrain ends with the refrain "neyleyim neyleyim" (what shall I do, what shall I do); the words before the refrain, "yazım, sözüm, dizim, kazım", form the rhyme. In the first quatrain the second and fourth lines are linked by the refrain; in the following quatrains the first three lines rhyme among themselves: "etmiyor, gitmiyor, tutmuyor", "yoluna, seyrine, köyüne". The syllable count is ours. The pen name appears in the last quatrain. When it was sung is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Unlike most of Kul Fakir's poems, the deyiş uses no explicit Sufi term and is framed as a reproach. The âşık says that writing the pain in his heart in a ledger would be of no use, that the word he spoke to the beloved was not heeded. The refrain "neyleyim" says in each quatrain that something has come to nothing: the word, the writing, the knees, and in the end the grave. Broken arms that will not hold and knees that are of no use are a familiar way in folk poetry of expressing helplessness through the failing of the body.

Fatih Çelebi reads the last quatrain as an example of the word "dost" being used in Kul Fakir's poetry in the sense of a companion. In his view the line "Dost düşman çıktı seyrine" says that the people with whom the âşık walked and whom he took for friends turned their backs on him and left him alone on the road, and the lines "Mezarımı dost köyüne / Kazım neyleyim neyleyim" show that he did not give up friendship nonetheless. The line can also be read differently: friend and foe alike have come out to watch the âşık's plight. Both readings lead into the image of death in the last line. The "dost köyü" is both the place where friends live and, in Sufi language, the land of the Beloved, that is, God; the deyiş seems deliberately left between these two meanings.

Bibliography

Books

Online sources