Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün

Kimseler bencileyin ‘aşḳa giriftâr olmasun
Kimsenüñ bencileyin sevdügi aġyâr olmasun
Kimsenüñ yâri gözinden dûr olup yâd olmasun
Kimseler ġam ḫânesinde çâr u nâ-çâr olmasun
Kimseler dil-ḫaste olup düşmesün yârdan cüdâ
Kimsenüñ şehrinde ‘âlem gözine ṭar olmasun
Kimselerüñ gül gibi yâri yüzine gülmesün
Kimseler bülbül gibi feryâd idüp zâr olmasun
Dilerem Ḥaḳ Ḥażretinden Mihrî gibi dostum
Gice gündüz zâri ḳıl yârüñ saña yâr olmasun

In English

1. Let no one be caught in love as I am; let no one's beloved turn into an outsider (aġyâr: stranger, rival) as mine has. (The couplet can also be understood as "let no one's beloved go over to the other side or make friends with rivals.")

2. Let no one's beloved drift out of his sight and become a stranger to him; let no one be left helpless, willing or not, in the house of grief.

3. Let no one fall away from the beloved with a sick heart; let the world not grow narrow to anyone's eyes in his own city.

4. Let no one's beloved, rose-like, laugh in his face (at his plight); let no one wail and lament like the nightingale. (In divan poetry the opening of a rose is called "laughing"; the rose laughs, the nightingale weeps.)

5. My friend, I ask the Almighty that you too, like Mihrî, weep and lament night and day, and that your beloved not be a friend to you. (The couplet can be read in two ways: "like Mihrî" describes the praying poet and means "I wish, as Mihrî"; or the beloved is told "weep like Mihrî". In both readings the closing couplet ties the good wish that runs through the poem to a curse aimed at the beloved.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The hundred and thirty-second ghazal of the Divan has five couplets and is written in the remel metre of the aruz, in the pattern "Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is "olmasun" (let there not be); the rhyme is built on the sound "-âr" before it (giriftâr, aġyâr, nâ-çâr, zâr, yâr). The word "ṭar" in the third couplet joins this series somewhat loosely in sound, with its short vowel. In Arslan's edition the ghazal rests on the M and Ü manuscripts and stands in the section of the letter Nûn in the Divan. There is no record of whom it was written for. In Didem Havlioğlu's electronic text it is also found, taken from the Istanbul manuscript alone, as ghazal 135; no difference that changes the meaning is seen among the readings.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole weight of the ghazal lies in the redif and in the word "kimse" (no one), repeated at the head of each couplet. As Mihrî tells of her own pain, she pours it into the mould of a wish: what has happened to me, let it not happen to anyone else. This construction gives the poem a tone at once humble and bitter; the lover finds her state so heavy that she can describe it only by saying "may it be no one's lot". Four of the five couplets open in the same way (Kimseler, Kimsenüñ, Kimseler, Kimselerüñ); this repetition (tekrir) both sets the rhythm and binds the couplets tightly to one another. In the opening couplet it is also notable that the word "bencileyin" (like me) is used in both lines; the poet puts herself forward as the measure in every line.

The troubles listed in the couplets are the familiar links of separation in divan poetry: the beloved's keeping company with the rival, her drifting from sight and becoming a stranger, the lover's being left helpless in the house of grief, the heart parted from the beloved finding the world narrow. The line in the third couplet, "Kimsenüñ şehrinde ‘âlem gözine ṭar olmasun", is a plain and effective way of saying that one may feel like a stranger in one's own city, even one's own house. The fourth couplet uses the motif of the rose and the nightingale. Because the opening of the rose is called "laughing" in divan poetry, the beloved's laughter "like a rose" is set against the lover's lament "like a nightingale"; there is a congruence of images (tenasüp) among the words rose, nightingale, laughing and lament. The phrase "yüzine gülmek" (to laugh in someone's face) works in two directions here: it recalls the opening of the rose, but it also describes a beloved who laughs off the lover's state without caring.

The closing couplet is the least expected place in the poem. After four couplets in which the poet wishes that no one fall into these troubles, in the last she turns to the beloved, whom she addresses as "my friend", and asks God that she weep night and day and that her own beloved not be a friend to her. A general good wish thus turns into a curse aimed at a single person. In divan poetry it is a familiar form of reproach for the lover to say to the beloved "may you burn as I do"; by placing it directly after the repetition of "no one" in the first four couplets, Mihrî makes the reproach sharper. Read as the voice of a woman poet, this lover's stance, which is not content with entreaty but, when needed, calls the beloved to account, shows plainly in the last couplet.

The ghazal has also drawn interest in our own day. It appears under the title "Kimseler Bencileyin Aşka Giriftar Olmasın" on the album "Mihrînağmeler", released in 2015 by the Amasya Municipality with settings of Mihrî Hatun's poems, and is sung by Güzin Değişmez. The setting is said to be by Ayşe Başak Harmancı and to be in the hicaz makam.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, p. 120, Ghazal 132 (M 86a, Ü 58a). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Books

  • Güzin Değişmez and Ahmet Hakkı Turabi, Mihrînağmeler (album), 2015; track list: https://www.deezer.com/en/album/9928674
  • Entries "mihrinağmeler" and "kimseler bencileyin aşka griftar olmasın", ekşi sözlük (on the album's production and the composition). eksisozluk.com

Other sources

  • Didem Havlioğlu (ed.), "Ğazeliyyāt-ı Mihri-i Hāqīre", türkoloji-iran, 2007 (a different transliteration of the ghazal, ghazal 135).

Online sources