Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilâtün Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilün

Egerçi yazamadum ḥüsnüñüñ kitâbetini
Velîk çoḳ oḳumuşam cemâlüñ âyetini
Baña müfessiri ‘aşḳuñ ezelde bildürdi
Lebüñ ‘ibâretini gör Ḥaḳ'uñ hidâyetini
Egerçi müşkil idi lîk cânda ḥıfẓ itdüm
Ṣaçuñ mesâ’ili ile yüzüñ ḫavâṣetini
Cemâlüñ adına ḫuṭbe oḳur göñül her dem
Kim itdi imdi cihânda bunuñ ḫiṭâbetini
Ḳo zülfi ḳıṣṣasın oḳı cemâli muṣḥafını
Götürmek ister iseñ cân u dil ḍalâletini
Müyesser ola görem mi ḥabîbimüñ bir gün
Cefâsı terki ile cevrinüñ nihâyetini
Beni uş uş ile egler raḳîbi bûse ile
Aña ‘inâyetini gör baña nezâketini
Kişiye ẓulm begüm pâdişâhı eyleyicek
Kimüñ ḳapusına varup ider şikâyetini
Cefâlaruñ ġamıla cevrüñüñ risâlesini
Oḳımayan ne bilür Mihrî'nüñ ḥikâyetini

In English

1. Though I could not write the book of your beauty, I have read the verses of your face's loveliness many times. ("Kitâbet" means writing, the scribe's craft; "âyet" means both a verse of the Qur'an and a sign or token.)

2. The interpreter of love taught me in pre-eternity: look at what your lip expresses, and at the guidance of God. (The couplet can be read in two ways: God, who interprets and explains love, taught the lover the meaning of the lip in pre-eternity; or the lover sees in the lip's speech God's guidance to the right path.)

3. Though it was difficult, I learned by heart in my soul the questions posed by your hair and the properties of your face. ("Mesâ’il" are the questions of jurisprudence; tangled hair is likened to problems hard to unravel. The word "ḫavâṣet" appears in this form in the edition; from the context the sense "properties, qualities" emerges.)

4. The heart recites the khutba in the name of your beauty at every moment; who else in the world has now delivered such an oration?

5. If you wish to remove the straying of soul and heart, leave the tale of the tress and read the Qur'an codex of the face. (The darkness of the hair suggests unbelief, the radiance of the face faith.)

6. Will it be granted me one day to see my beloved abandon cruelty and the end of his tyranny?

7. He keeps me waiting with "there, there", while he entertains my rival with kisses; see his favour to him and his delicacy toward me. (The couplet can be read in two ways: the lover is kept waiting with "uş uş", while the rival is entertained with the "bûse", the kiss; or the beloved keeps the lover occupied with the kisses he gives to the rival. One manuscript reads "iñledür", "makes me moan", in place of "egler".)

8. My lord, if the sovereign oppresses a man, at whose door can that man go to make his complaint? (The beloved is imagined as a sovereign; when the tyranny comes from him there is no other door to appeal to.)

9. Whoever has not read the treatise of your cruelties and the sorrow of your tyranny, what can he know of Mihrî's story?

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The one hundred and seventy-seventh ghazal (gazel) has nine couplets (beyit) and is composed in the müctes metre of aruz (quantitative metre), in the pattern "Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilâtün Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is the suffix "-ini"; the rhyme (kafiye) is built on words of Arabic origin ending in sounds such as "-âyet", "-âbet" and "-âlet": kitâbet, âyet, hidâyet, ḫiṭâbet, ḍalâlet, nihâyet, nezâket, şikâyet, ḥikâyet. The ghazal is in the Yâ section of the Divan and appears in three manuscripts in the Arslan edition. There is no information about whom it was written for.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

What holds the whole ghazal together is a broad congruence of images (tenasüp) made up of words taken from reading, writing and the religious sciences. The words kitâbet, âyet, müfessir, ‘ibâret, hidâyet, ḥıfẓ, mesâ’il, ḫuṭbe, ḫiṭâbet, ḳıṣṣa, muṣḥaf, ḍalâlet, risâle and ḥikâyet present the beloved's beauty as a sacred text and the lover as a student who reads, memorizes and interprets it. In Divan poetry, likening the beloved's face to a book or to a codex of the Qur'an (Mushaf) is a familiar topos; Mihrî sustains it for nine couplets and so builds the ghazal on a single comparison.

Gülşen Kaya notes that the phrase "interpreter of love" in the second couplet means God. According to this, it is the Creator himself who taught the lover, in pre-eternity, the meaning in the beloved's lip; love is thus conceived as guidance (hidayet), a way to the right path. The fifth couplet builds the same idea from the opposite side. In Kaya's reading, the blackness of the tress in this couplet points to unbelief and the unbeliever, and the face to faith; if soul and heart wish to be freed from error, they must leave the dark story of the hair and read the codex of the face. There is antithesis between zülf and cemâl, between ḳıṣṣa and muṣḥaf, and between ḍalâlet and hidâyet.

The third couplet mentions the "mesâ’il", the questions, of the hair. The word alludes to the hard questions in works of jurisprudence; tangled and curling hair is likewise a hard question. This double meaning gives the couplet the quality of a double entendre (tevriye). In the fourth couplet the heart is a preacher reciting the khutba in the name of beauty. Kaya gives this couplet as an example of the heart being likened to a preacher who delivers the khutba in the name of the beloved's face. In the Ottoman tradition the mention of the ruler's name in the Friday khutba was a sign of sovereignty; that the heart recites the khutba in the name of the beloved's beauty therefore means that it acknowledges her sovereignty.

The seventh couplet brings the rival onto the scene and breaks the sacred-text atmosphere of the ghazal with an everyday scene of jealousy. In the eighth couplet the figure of sovereignty is stated outright: the beloved is a sovereign, and when tyranny comes from him there is no door left to turn to. Kaya mentions this couplet, within the Divan's conception of the sovereign, as an example of the expectation that a ruler should be just and not oppress. In the closing couplet (makta) Mihrî says that whoever has not read a "risâle", a treatise, on cruelty and sorrow cannot understand her story; the image of the book and of reading with which the ghazal began is thus tied in the last couplet to the poet's own life story.

Differences between manuscripts are more numerous in this ghazal than in the others, as Arslan's footnotes show. The most striking is in the opening couplet: two manuscripts read "ḫaṭṭınuñ" or "ḫaṭṭuñuñ" in place of "ḥüsnüñüñ" (of your beauty). Since "ḫaṭṭ" means both writing and the down on the cheek, this reading forms a tighter congruence of images with the word kitâbet.

Bibliography

  • Mehmet Arslan (hzl.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, pp. 143-144, Gazel 177 (F 73b, S 75a, Ü 67a). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr
  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2010, pp. 84, 96, 145, 216. openaccess.firat.edu.tr