Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: eleven-syllable syllabic metre

Güzel şahtan bize bir dolu geldi
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver
Hünkâr Hacı Bektaş Veli’den geldi
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver
Herkes sevdiğini tanır sesinden
Şahın muhabbeti beni has eden
Selman’ın keşkülün doldur bu sudan
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver
Payım gelir erenlerin payından
Muhammed neslinden Ali soyundan
Kırklar’ın içtiği engür suyundan
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver
Beline kuşanmış nurdan bir kemer
İçmişim doluyu yüreğim yanar
Herkes sevdiğinden bir dolu umar
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver
Senin âşıkların kaynadı coştu
Cananın uğruna serinden geçti
Sefil (Kul) Hüseyin’im bir dolu içti
Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver

In English

1. A cup has come to us from the fair Shah; you drink, my lord, and give me some too. It has come from the Hünkâr Hacı Bektaş Velî; you drink, my lord, and give me some too.

2. Everyone knows his beloved by his voice; it is the Shah's fellowship that has made me pure. Fill Selman's bowl with this water; you drink, my lord, and give me some too.

3. My share comes from the share of the saints, from the line of Muhammad, the lineage of Ali, from the grape juice the Forty drank; you drink, my lord, and give me some too.

4. He has girded a belt of light about his waist; I have drunk the cup, my heart is burning. Everyone hopes for a cup from the one he loves; you drink, my lord, and give me some too.

5. Your lovers have boiled up and surged; for the sake of the beloved they have given up their heads. Poor Kul Hüseyin has drunk a cup; you drink, my lord, and give me some too.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

Işık notes that this deyiş is widely known and sung with fervour in the gatherings of Gaziler Ovacığı; he classes it as a güzelleme. The refrain is a word of offering: "Bir sen iç efendim bir de bana ver" (you drink, my lord, and give me some too) holds the even-numbered lines of the first quatrain and returns in the fourth line of the later quatrains. The odd-numbered lines of the first quatrain end on "geldi" (came); in the other quatrains the first three lines rhyme ("sesinden, eden, sudan", "payından, soyundan, suyundan", "kemer, yanar, umar", "coştu, geçti, içti"). The text runs to five quatrains in the eleven-syllable syllabic metre. In the last quatrain the pen name (mahlas) reads "Sefil (Kul) Hüseyin'im". The text was collected from the accounts of Halil Sezgin and another informant.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The "dolu" is the cup offered in Alevi-Bektashi cem and gatherings; it stands both for a real drink and for divine love and grace. In the deyiş the cup comes "from the fair Shah", from the Hünkâr Hacı Bektaş Velî. The lover offers it first to his master, his guide, and asks a share for himself. The second and third quatrains tie the cup to the narrative of the assembly of the Forty: Selman's bowl and the grape juice drunk by the Forty recall the cem of the Forty that, in Alevi belief, Muhammad attended.

The last quatrain contains the lines Işık quotes when describing Kul Hüseyin's life. According to Işık, with these words Kul Hüseyin points to the lovers being sated and satisfied by drinking from one another; this state of passing beyond existence for the beloved's sake is the state of God's lovers, and the wound born of it is Hüseyin's wound. That the deyiş is so loved in the region may also be explained by its refrain being well suited to singing together in a gathering; this is our interpretation.

Bibliography

Online sources