Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fe‘ilâtün Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilün

Cân virürüm saña behey kâfir
Bir naẓar ḳıl baña behey kâfir
Sen gül idüñ çemende ben bülbül
Ol zamânı añ a behey kâfir
Beni cevri ile sen öldürmek
Kim görübdür revâ behey kâfir
Çekmişem ben cefâñı biñ kerre
Sen de it bir vefâ behey kâfir
Bizi bir bûse ile yâd itseñ
Olmaz idi ḫaṭâ behey kâfir
Dil ki derd-mendüñdür evvelden
Derdine ḳıl devâ behey kâfir
Cân u dilden saña bu ‘âlemde
Mihrî'dür mübtelâ behey kâfir

In English

1. O infidel, I give my life to you; look at me just once. ("Behey" is an exclamation of address. "Kâfir" (infidel) is an epithet used in divan poetry for a beloved who shows the lover no pity or favour and is without mercy.)

2. You were the rose in the garden and I the nightingale; O infidel, remember that time once.

3. O infidel, who has thought it fitting, who has found it right, to kill me with your cruelty?

4. I have borne your torment a thousand times; O infidel, you too show faithfulness once.

5. If you were to remember us with a kiss, there would be no fault in it, O infidel.

6. The heart has long been afflicted with your pain; O infidel, find a remedy for its pain.

7. O infidel, in this world it is Mihrî who has been smitten by you with soul and heart.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal (gazel), which stands twenty-ninth in Mehmet Arslan's edition, has seven couplets (beyit) and is found in the divan's section "Ḥarfü'r-Râ"; because the divan's ghazals are arranged by the last letter of the redif (refrain word), this poem, ending in the word "kâfir", falls under the letter r. Its metre is the pattern "Fe‘ilâtün Mefâ‘ilün Fe‘ilün". This short pattern, each line of eleven syllables, gives the ghazal a quick flow close to spoken language. The redif is the address "behey kâfir"; the rhyme is made by the long "â" sound at the end of the words saña, baña, aña, revâ, vefâ, ḫaṭâ, devâ and mübtelâ. Because both lines of the opening couplet (matla) end with the same redif, the address is heard eight times in a poem of seven couplets; this repetition gives the poem the air of an entreaty.

The ghazal is found only in manuscript Ü (34a) among the four manuscripts on which the edition is based. Arslan notes in a footnote that the metre of the first line of the sixth couplet ("Dil ki derd-mendüñdür evvelden") is faulty; this may result from the text resting on a single manuscript. The word printed "añ a" in the second couplet in the edition is read "aña" in Didem Havlioğlu's electronic text; in either case the sense "recall that time, remember" does not change. There is no information on whom the poem was written for or when.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole weight of the poem gathers in the address "kâfir" directed at the beloved. Studying the likenesses to infidel, idol (sanem) and image (büt) in Mihrî's divan, Gülşen Kaya notes that this epithet is given to the beloved on account of indifference and cruelty: the lover gives her life on the beloved's path and expects in return only a glance; the beloved gives no favour, does not recall the torment she has inflicted, and does not cure the pain. To show the meaning of this epithet Kaya chooses precisely the third couplet of this ghazal as her example. The flow of the ghazal matches this definition: in the first couplet a glance is asked, in the fourth faithfulness just once, in the fifth a kiss, in the sixth a remedy for the pain. The requests are listed in diminishing order, and each carries the weight of a wish already refused.

The second couplet is the most striking place in the ghazal. Rose and nightingale are, in divan poetry, the best-known counterparts of beloved and lover; Kaya shows that this comparison rests on likening the beloved to the rose, the lover to the nightingale and the rival to the thorn, and that Mihrî's couplet is her example. Here, however, the verb is in the past: "Sen gül idüñ, ben bülbül." The poet reminds the beloved of a closeness that was once mutual and asks her to remember that day. The reproach in the rest of the ghazal draws its strength from this reminder.

The figures of speech are kept plain. The question "Kim görübdür revâ" in the third couplet is a question that expects no answer and is asked to refuse something (istifham, rhetorical question). In the fourth couplet "cefâ" and "vefâ", and in the sixth "derd" and "devâ", are set side by side as opposing or complementary concepts (antithesis and tenasüp, congruence of images). The pair "cân u dil" in the last couplet expresses the lover's complete devotion; "mübtelâ" means both enamoured and seized by an affliction. The plain and sincere style noted by Erünsal is clearly seen in this ghazal: Arabic and Persian compounds are almost absent, and the sentences follow the order of everyday speech.

A Contemporary from Amasya with the Same Redif

Comparing the shared rediflar in the divans of Mihrî Hatun and her contemporary, also from Amasya, Tâcîzâde Cafer Çelebi, Sıtkı Nazik sets this ghazal beside the twenty-fifth ghazal that Cafer Çelebi wrote with the same "behey kâfir" redif. In Cafer Çelebi's poem too the lover asks mercy of a beloved who has thrown enough stones of torment ("Yiter atdun cefâ taşın raḥm it / Burç degüldür beden behey kâfir", "Enough of throwing the stones of torment, show mercy; the body is not a bastion, O infidel") and begs her not to increase her coquetry and flee. According to Nazik, in the two ghazals "cevr" and "naz", and "vefa" and "rahm", correspond in sense, while the word "cefa" appears in both exactly. The rhymes of the two poems differ; what is shared is the redif and the subject.

In assessing the similarities between the two poets, Nazik says plainly that there is no information that one wrote a nazire (response poem) to the other. He thinks that these two poets, mentioned in the same years in the circle of Bayezid II and Prince Ahmed in Amasya, may have seen each other's poems, and that Mihrî, whom he finds stronger in emotion, may have influenced Cafer Çelebi; but he reaches no firm judgement on which influenced which, and adds that both poets may have drawn on higher models such as Ahmed Paşa and Necâtî.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, pp. 65-66, Gazel 29 (Ü 34a) and footnote on manuscript variants. ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Academic studies

  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Divânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2010 (sections on rose and nightingale, kâfir, sanem and büt). openaccess.firat.edu.tr
  • Sıtkı Nazik, "Benzer Redifli Şiirleri Bağlamında Mihrî Hatun ve Tâcî-zâde Cafer Çelebi'nin Karşılaştırılması", Uluslararası Amasya Âlimleri Sempozyumu Bildiriler Kitabı II, Amasya 2017, pp. 133-148 (especially pp. 140-141).

Books

  • Didem Havlioğlu (ed.), Ġazeliyyât-ı Mihrî-i Ḥaḳîre, OTAP electronic edition, ghazal 30 (text published on the türkoloji-iran page, 2007).
  • İsmail E. Erünsal, "Mihrî Hatun", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 30, pp. 37-38. islamansiklopedisi.org.tr

Online sources