Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefʿūlü mefāʿilün feʿūlün

Ey luṭfı ʿamīm feyżi fevvār
Luṭfuñla bulur vücūdı āŝār
Sebḳ eylemeden niyāz u nāzım
Maḥż-ı keremiñden eylediñ var
Varlıḳda daḫi sezā-yı luṭf it
Çün eylediñ evvelī sezā-vār
Bir ḳabża-i türāb āsitānım
Ḳıl ḫāk-i deriñde ḳıymet iẓhār
Bir reşḥa-i āb-ı rāfetiñdir
Her şeydeki āb-ı rūy-ı hem-vār
Bir ḳaṭre-i zülāl raḥmetiñdir
Aṣdāfıñ içinde dürr-i şeh-vār
Olsun eŝerim ʿazīz-i devrān
Nādānlar elinde olmasın ḫār

In English

1. O you whose kindness embraces all and whose bounty gushes forth; created things find their being through your kindness.

2. Before either my entreaty or my pride had come forward, you brought me into being purely out of your generosity.

3. Now that I exist, make me worthy of your kindness as well; for at the very first you deemed me worthy.

4. I am a handful of earth at your threshold; show some worth in me in the dust of your door.

5. The even lustre (the "water of the face", honour) in every thing is a trickle from the water of your compassion.

6. The royal pearl within the shells is a drop of the clear water of your mercy.

7. Let my work be held dear by the age; let it not be despised in the hands of the ignorant.

Literary and Historical Commentary

A Short Supplication

These seven couplets, coming straight after the poem of praise, are a plain example of the custom by which a münacat (supplication) follows the tevhid in a divan. The metre is "mef'ûlü mefâilün feûlün", familiar from the Leylâ and Mecnun mesnevis; the short lines give the entreaty a quiet, prayer-like rhythm. Fevvâr, âsâr, sezâ-vâr, izhâr, şeh-vâr and hâr meet in the rhyme "-âr"; no pen name is used.

The backbone of the thought lies in the second and third couplets. Man was brought into being solely through divine generosity, before he knew how to entreat or to be proud; so once he exists he may ask to be made worthy of the same kindness. The fourth couplet has the poet call himself "kabza-i türâb", a handful of earth, and say that this earth will find its worth only at the Friend's door. With the fifth and sixth couplets the image of water comes forward. "Âb-ı rû", the water of the face, is an old idiom for a person's honour; Cûdî ties the lustre in every thing to a drop trickling from divine compassion. The pearl inside the shell, too, is a drop of the water of mercy, according to the old belief that a drop of April rain falling into a shell turns into a pearl.

The last couplet turns the prayer into a personal wish: may his work be held dear by the age and not be despised in the hands of the ignorant. This wish from a poet who kept his poems from print and, by the account of those close to him, hid them almost jealously, takes on a further meaning when set beside the fact that the divan survives only as a single copy written out by his brother.

Bibliography

  • Havva Tok Yıldız, Merzifonlu İbrâhîm Cûdî Dîvânı (İnceleme-Metin-Sözlük) [1b-43a], Master's thesis, Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun 2017, p. 13 (poem no. 2; manuscript fol. 1b-2a). http://libra.omu.edu.tr/tezler/116853.pdf

Online sources