Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefāʿilün mefāʿilün mefāʿilün mefāʿilün

Küşād-ı ʿuḳde-i ḥayāta baġlıdır ki vuṣlatı
Fe-ḥurrimet ʿaleyye in ḥalaltuhā eḥallet
alınarak sıralandırılmıştır.
Ne nāzdır, ne şīvedir güzelligin bilir ḳaçar
Teḳanneʿat fe-esferet, velleytuhā fe-vellet
Cemāline ḥavāle eyledim nigāh-ı iştiyāḳ
Fe-ḳābelet ve seyfe laḥẓihā ʿaleyye sellet
Ne ḫoşdur iḥtilāf-ı cins ile vifāḳ-ı iḥtisās
Metā ṣadartu ṣaderet ve in meliltu mellet
A naḥvı maḥv iden güzel ṣılātı ḥaẕfe yoḳ maḥal
Fe-mā tüfīdu lafẓatā "ene'llezī", "hiye'lletī"
Şebābıñ incilā-yı tāmına ararsañ āyine
Fe-şemsu vechike'lletī raʾeytuhā tecellet
Cemāl-i bā-kemāliñiz bedīʿadır ḥaḳīḳaten
Nigāh idiñ ki āyine beyān ider ḥaḳīḳati

In English

1. Union with her depends on untying the knot of life (of modesty); (Arabic:) "She was forbidden to me; if I untie the knot, she becomes lawful."

2. Neither coquetry nor grace: she knows her beauty and flees; (Arabic:) "She veiled herself, then unveiled; I turned to her, and she turned away."

3. I entrusted my gaze of longing to her beauty; (Arabic:) "She faced me and drew the sword of her glance against me."

4. How fine is the accord of feeling with the difference of sex; (Arabic:) "Whenever I went forth, she went forth; and if I grew weary, she grew weary."

5. O beauty who wipes out grammar, there is no room to drop the relative clauses; (Arabic:) "What do the words 'I am the one who' and 'she is the one who' convey?"

6. If you seek a mirror for the full radiance of youth, (Arabic:) "the sun of your face that I saw has shone forth."

7. Your beauty, endowed with perfection, is truly a wonder; look, for the mirror tells the truth.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The first line of each couplet Turkish, the second Arabic: the ghazal is a mülemma; only the last couplet is Turkish in both lines. Its title is left blank in the thesis, and according to the thesis's footnote the couplets are numbered out of order in the divan and the thesis has arranged them by these numbers. The Arabic lines are built on a common rhyme ending in the sound "-llet": ehallet, vellet, sellet, mellet, tecellet.

The ghazal tells a love story in short scenes: the beloved veils herself, then unveils; when the lover turns to her she turns away; she faces him and draws the sword of her glance. In the fourth couplet, however, there is a moment of harmony: wherever the lover goes the beloved goes, if the lover grows weary she grows weary too. The fifth couplet carries one of the grammar jokes the divan loves: the beloved is a beauty who "wipes out grammar"; yet in Arabic relative pronouns such as "ellezî" and "elletî" convey nothing without the relative clause, the "sıla", that follows them. So lover and beloved too are like two words that remain meaningless without each other's "sıla". The mülemma form shows in poetry the skill of a madrasa-trained man able to use Arabic and Turkish in equal measure. The reading of the Arabic lines in Latin letters is ours.

Bibliography

  • Zeynep Adıyahşi, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [43b-87b], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, pp. 111-112 (poem no. 263; manuscript fol. 78a-78b). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116831.pdf

Online sources