Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün

Göziñ nergis dehānıñ ġonce ruḫsārıñ açılmış gül
Ḳadiñ ꜤarꜤar ḫaṭıñ gūyā benefşe kākülüñ sünbül
Nedir ol o siyāha böyle ruḫsat virmege bāꜤis
Hemīşe gerden ü ruḫsārıñı būs itmede kākül
Düzilsin bezm-i mey muṭrib ser-āġāz eylesin sāḳī
Bir olsun hep piyāle hem ṣürāḥī eylesin ġulġul
Ġaraż cām-ı lebiñdir bezm-i mey tertībin itmekde
Ṣaḳın ẓann itme cānā eyleyem ben ārzū-yı mül
Sen inṣāf it görünce āb u tābıñ Mihrī-i nālān
Ne mümkin olmasa hīç gülsitān ḥüsn ile bir bülbül

In English

1. Your eye is a narcissus, your mouth a bud, your cheek an opened rose; your stature a juniper, the down on your face as if a violet, your forelock a hyacinth.

2. What is the reason for giving that black one (the dark forelock) such licence, that it keeps kissing your neck and cheek all the time? (Hair falling over the face and neck is imagined as someone kissing the beloved.)

3. Let the wine party be laid out, let the musician begin to play, let the cupbearer pass round the cups; let all the cups be as one, and let the decanter, as it pours the wine, say "gulgul".

4. O dear one, my aim in arranging the wine party is the cup of your lip; do not for a moment think that I want wine.

5. Seeing your brilliance and freshness, the lamenting Mihrî asks you to be just: how could it be that a rose garden adorned with beauty should have no nightingale? (The beloved is the rose garden, and Mihrî, lamenting for her beauty, is the nightingale.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

This ghazal is not found in Mihrî Hatun's divan. It is recorded under the pen name (mahlas) Mihrî, with the compiler's heading "Mihrî-i Nâlân" (Mihrî the Lamenting), on folio 67a of the poetry anthology numbered 43 Va 2871 in the Kütahya Vahid Paşa Provincial Public Library. Mutlu Muhammet Aktaş, who published the anthology, regards it as a strong possibility that the ghazals in it belong to Mihrî Hatun but says that no firm verdict can be given; the attribution of the poem is therefore uncertain. According to Aktaş, headings such as "Mihrî-i Rüsvâ", "Mihrî-i Ġam-ḫ˘âr" and "Mihrî-i Nâlân" belong to the compiler rather than the poet and were chosen according to the subject of the ghazal. In this ghazal the heading was taken from the words "Mihrî-i nâlân" in the closing couplet (makta).

The ghazal has five couplets (beyit). Of the twenty ghazals with the pen name Mihrî in the anthology, fifteen are in the remel metre; this ghazal is one of five written in the hezec metre, in the aruz (quantitative metre) pattern "Mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün", and Aktaş reminds us that both patterns are used in Mihrî's divan. The ghazal has no redif (refrain word); the rhyme (kafiye) is built on the sounds "-ül" and "-ul" (gül, sünbül, kâkül, ġulġul, mül, bülbül). According to Aktaş's footnote, the metre falters in the fourth couplet. There is no information on to whom the ghazal was addressed.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet (matla) is a dense example of the tradition in divan poetry of describing the beloved as a rose garden. Six similes are lined up one after another in a single couplet: the eye to a narcissus, the mouth to a bud, the cheek to an opened rose, the stature to a juniper, the down to a violet, the forelock to a hyacinth. The link between eye and narcissus comes from the round part at the centre of the narcissus that resembles an eye; the bud stands for the small, closed mouth, and the hyacinth and violet stand for hair and down by their dark colour and their curls. When listing the similarities between the anthology ghazals and the divan, Aktaş particularly mentions the conception of the beloved's beauty as a rose garden and the density of flower similes; the bud for the mouth, the narcissus for the eye and the rose for the face come first among them. In this couplet there is a strong congruence of images (tenasüp) among the flower names.

The second couplet is a fanciful aetiology (hüsn-i ta‘lîl) built on the forelock. The beloved's hair falls on her face and neck naturally; the poet interprets this as the forelock taking leave to kiss the beloved, and asks who gave that leave. The question carries the voice of a lover jealous of the privilege granted to the black hair.

The third couplet draws a wine-party scene: the musician, the cupbearer, the cups and the decanter. The word "ġulġul" imitates the sound made when wine is poured from a decanter; a word formed by onomatopoeia, it gives the scene life. The fourth couplet then explains the true purpose of this scene: the party is arranged, but what the lover wants is not wine but the beloved's lip. The lip is likened to a cup and is preferred to wine. Thus the description of a carousing gathering is tied, unexpectedly, to the subject of love.

In the closing couplet the rose-garden image returns, and this time in connection with the beginning of the ghazal. The beloved, woven from flowers in the opening couplet, is here regarded entirely as a rose garden (gülistan); the nightingale of this garden is the lamenting Mihrî. Rose and nightingale are the best-known pair of beloved and lover in divan poetry, and the nightingale's lament for the rose stands for the lover's cry. The epithet "nâlân" (lamenting) joins in a single word the nightingale's song and the lover's moaning. The poet asks the beloved for justice: a face that is a garden of beauty cannot fail to have a nightingale in love with it.

Bibliography

  • Mutlu Muhammet Aktaş, "Mihrî Hatun'un Yayımlanmamış Gazelleri", Hikmet-Akademik Edebiyat Dergisi 9/18 (Spring 2023), pp. 121-122, ghazal 17 and n. 7 (Kütahya Vahid Paşa İl Halk Ktp. 43 Va 2871 Mecmû‘a-i Eş‘âr, f. 67a); compiler's headings and metres p. 111; discussion of attribution pp. 110-112, 124. doi:10.28981/hikmet.1200789. https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/2757129

Online sources