Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefāʿilün feʿilātün mefāʿilün feʿilün

Şeb-i şebāb nihād oldu hey şebānelerim
Bozuldı ṭurra-ı dil-dār, düşdi lānelerim
Bu gün şebābımı teşyīʿ ider ḥazīn ḥazīn
Nevā-yı şevḳ-i şebān-gāh olan terānelerim
Uyutdı dīde-i baḫtım gibi güzel gözlerini
Meger ki yāre ḥaḳīḳat gelir fesānelerim
Hani o dem ki düşürdüñ şükūfeñi diyerek
Ederdi ḫande-zen ol ġonceyi bahānelerim
Nesīmi mevce virüp ince ince āhlarım
Ṭarardı zülfüni her ṣubḥ-gāh şānelerim
Ṭurur mı pāyine tenhāda cebhe-sā olaraḳ
Lebimle simsiyāh itdigim nişānelerim
Bilir mi ḥāli ki müstaḳbele nīyāz ideyim
Geçen zamān uzar dest-i istiʿānelerim

In English

1. Hey, my nights of revelry, the night of youth has hidden itself and ended; the beloved's forelock is undone, my nests have fallen. (The reading of the word "nihād" in the first line is not certain.)

2. My songs, once the melody of the night's delight, today see my youth off, mournfully, mournfully.

3. My tales put the beloved's lovely eyes to sleep, like the eye of my fortune; it seems my tales sounded true to her.

4. Do you remember the time when my excuses made that rosebud laugh by saying "you dropped your flower"?

5. My sighs would ripple the morning breeze, finely, finely, and my combs would comb her locks every dawn.

6. Do the marks I blackened with my lips, rubbing my brow on her feet in solitude, still remain?

7. Does the present know that I should plead with the future? My hands that beg for help reach out to time gone by.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Farewell to Youth

Lost youth is recalled in this ghazal entirely in the language of the past tense. The closeness in sound between "şeb-i şebâb", the night of youth, and "şebâneler", nightly revels, in the first line continues with "şebângâh" in the second couplet; night and youth meet in one family of words. The poet says that his songs, which once sang of the night's delight, now see his youth off "hazîn hazîn", mournfully. In the hands of a poet who often touches on his own old age in the divan, this becomes a personal poem standing between memory and mourning.

The middle couplets build small, lively scenes. The lover's tales put the beloved's eyes to sleep; his excuses make the rosebud laugh by teasing her "you dropped your flower"; his sighs ripple the morning breeze and combs comb her locks every morning. These details are closer to the intimacy of a diary than to the abstract portrait of the beloved in divan poetry. The question in the sixth couplet wonders whether the marks left in the past still remain.

The last couplet closes the ghazal with its thought on time. The present does not teach one to plead with the future; the hands that beg for help always reach towards the past. This backward look of old age gives the poem a personal tone, although it has neither pen name nor title. The thesis notes that after this poem page 11b of the manuscript was left blank.

Bibliography

  • Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, p. 41 (poem no. 31; manuscript fol. 11a). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf

Online sources