Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Mefāʿilün feʿilātün mefāʿilün feʿilün
Ġarīb! ḥālet-i bīdāri-i ḥayāt-ı ġarīb!
Ṭurur nigāh-ı ġarībimde kāʾināt-ı ġarīb
ʿAdīm iken baña reh-yāb-ı vücūd-ı ʿacīb!
Bu nīstīye o hestīden iltifāt-ı ġarīb
Hebā-yı münteşire intiẓām-ı cemʿiyyet
Bu intiẓāma teʿāḳub iden şetāt-ı ġarīb
Vücūd, ẓıll gibidir muttaṣıl zevāl-peẕīr
Zevāl içinde ʿayān müstemir ŝebāt-ı ġarīb
Temās-ı lemḥa-i vaḥdetle nā-mükedderdir
Miyān-ı rāʾī vü merʾīdeki ṣılāt-ı ġarīb
Degişdirir yerini muttaṣıl aḳar ḳaṭarāt
Bir istiṭālede ẓāhir hemān fürāt-ı ġarīb
Bir infirād-ı ġarīb üzredir ẓuhūr-ı vücūd
Vücūd-ı vāḥide bu muḫtelif-simāt-ı ġarīb
Lisān olaydı eger fikr ü fıṭrat-ı eşḫāṣ
Olurdı anda olan cümle-i lüġāt-ı ġarīb
Aḳar ḥayāt, tenāsül dinen ṭarīḳ üzre
Bu cery-i vāḥid içün "çifte ḫaṭ ḳanāt"-ı ġarīb
Ḥayāt, menbaʿ-ı eḥsās ü māye-i gül iken
Ṭurur meʿādin aña ecnebī, nebāt-ı ġarīb
ʿUmūma ʿāʾid olan niʿmet ü meṣāʾibde
Belā mürecciḥ iṣābet veyā necāt-ı ġarīb
Ṣıfāt, ẕāta meʾāŝir daḫı ṣıfāta delīl
Degil bu devr ü teselsülle keşf-i ẕāt-ı ġarīb
Baṣīret ehlini ḫulḳ-şinās ider Cūdī
Zebān-ı ḫāme-i muʿcizdeki nikāt-ı ġarīb
In English
1. Strange! This wakefulness of strange life, strange! In my estranged gaze the universe stands strange.
2. While I did not exist, that wondrous being found its way to me; strange is the favour of that being to this non-being (the couplet is not entirely clear).
3. The order of gathering among scattered motes; strange the dispersal that follows this order.
4. Being is like a shadow, ever open to fading; strange the lasting steadiness that appears within the fading.
5. Untroubled by the touch of a glance of unity, the strange bonds between the seer and the seen (the couplet is not entirely clear).
6. The flowing drops change their place without end; in one stretch only a strange Euphrates appears.
7. The appearing of being rests on a strange singularity; to a single being, these strange and different faces.
8. Were the thought and nature of persons a language, all the words in it would be strange.
9. Life flows along the road called procreation; for this single stream, a strange "double-tracked canal".
10. While life is the source of sensations and the leaven of clay, minerals stand foreign to it, plants strange.
11. In the blessings and calamities that come to all, strange the preference by which affliction strikes one and another is saved.
12. Attributes are evidence of the essence, and works of the attributes; the strange essence is not found out by this circle and chain (the line is not entirely clear).
13. Cûdî, the strange subtleties on the tongue of the wondrous pen make the people of insight knowers of creation.
Literary and Historical Commentary
A gaze that marvels at being as if seeing it for the first time finds a voice in the ghazal titled "İstiğrâb", finding things strange; in every couplet the refrain "-ât-ı garîb" repeats this wonder. The first couplet is a scene of awakening: both the wakefulness of life and the universe seen by the estranged gaze are strange. The following couplets count the contradictions of being: scattered motes gather in an order and disperse again; being fades without end like a shadow, yet within this fading a lasting steadiness appears.
The sixth couplet recalls an old philosophical image of the river: the drops change place without end, yet from afar only one Euphrates is seen; the river stays the same while its water is always other. The ninth couplet likens the passing of life from generation to generation to "a double-tracked canal"; the copyist's note explains that these two tracks are mothers and fathers. This simile of the railway or water canal recalls the love of modern images in the divan's railway poems. The eleventh couplet marvels at the secret of the choice of whom affliction will strike. The twelfth names the known method of kalâm: works are evidence of the attributes, the attributes of the essence; but for the poet the essence itself cannot be found out by this chain. The closing couplet turns wonder into knowledge: these strange subtleties make the people of insight knowers of creation.
Bibliography
- Zeynep Adıyahşi, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [43b-87b], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, pp. 116-117 (poem no. 271; manuscript fol. 79b-80a). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116831.pdf
Online sources
