Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Zülfüñ ü ḳaşuñ ḳadüñ gördüm ki cân andan çıḳar
Bunlara cân virmeyen elbette cânândan çıḳar
Tîr-i ġamzeñ ṭutmasun jengâr ġamdan dostum
Yüregümi yar gel peykânuñı ḳandan çıḳar
Bî-güneh maḥbûsdur çâh-ı zenaḫdânuñda dil
Zülfüñe aṣ ḳurtar ol miskîni zindândan çıḳar
Ben vefâ umduḳça ol bî-raḥm dilber âh kim
Cevri ḥadden aşurur nâz ile orandan çıḳar
Ġamzesi düzdi bulup dilde ḫayâli ḫaznesin
Didi el-ḥaḳdur ki dirler genc vîrândan çıḳar
Zülfüñe baş ḳoşdı ġamzeñ yaḳdı diller şehrini
Şimdi fitne ‘âleme sen çeşmi fettândan çıḳar
Müdde‘î sözi ile elden çıḳardum yâri âh
Her ki şeyṭâna uyar elbette îmândan çıḳar
Ey Belâ-keş Mihrî sen beñzer Belâyî neslisin
Saña dâ’im bî-vefâlar ġâlibâ andan çıḳar

In English

1. I saw your tress, your brow and your stature, and understood that the life departs the body because of them; whoever does not give his life to them will surely lose the beloved (be cast out of the beloved's presence).

2. My friend, let the arrow of your glance not rust from sorrow; come, split my heart and draw your arrowhead out of the blood. ("Ḳandan" means both "from the blood, from the bloody heart" and "from where"; the line can also be read, "split my heart and draw the tip of your arrow out from wherever it has remained".)

3. The heart is imprisoned without guilt in the well of your chin-dimple; hang it on your tress, rescue that poor wretch, draw him out of the dungeon. (The tress is imagined as a rope let down into the well.)

4. Ah, whenever I hope for fidelity, that pitiless beauty carries her cruelty beyond all bounds; with coquetry she goes beyond the measure.

5. Her glance, like a thief, found the treasure of her image in the heart and said, "It is true, they say that treasure comes out of ruins." (According to an old belief, the ruined heart is like the ruin in which treasures are hidden.)

6. Your glance joined forces with your tress and burned the city of hearts; now the mischief for the world comes from you, with your tempting eye.

7. Ah, following the rival's words I let the beloved slip from my hand; whoever follows Satan will surely depart from faith.

8. O Mihrî, who endures calamities, you seem to be of the line of Belâyî; that faithless people always turn up for you is probably because of this. (Belâyî is the pen name of the poet's father; the word also means "belonging to calamity".)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The thirty-ninth ghazal (gazel) of the divan has eight couplets (beyit) and is written in the aruz (quantitative metre) pattern "Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün", of the remel metre. The rhyme is the sound "-ân/-an" (cân, cânân, ḳan, zindân, oran, vîrân, fettân, îmân), and the redif (refrain word) is "-dan çıḳar". The word "çıḳar" in the redif is used in two different roles throughout the ghazal: in some couplets as an aorist statement ("comes out, arises"), in others as a command addressed to the beloved ("take out"). In the second and third couplets the sense of command comes to the fore, in the others that of statement. The ghazal is found in all four manuscripts (F 37b, M 52b, S 39b, Ü 36a).

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet (matla) says that life departs the body before the beloved's tress, brow and stature, and immediately sets the words "cân" and "cânân" against each other: whoever does not give his life to this beauty is lost to the cânân, that is, the beloved. The closeness in sound and root between the two words is a wordplay that carries the meaning of the couplet.

In the second couplet the beloved's glance (gamze) is an arrow, and the arrowhead (peykân) has remained in the lover's heart. Gülşen Kaya notes that in this couplet the word "ḳandan" means both "from the bloody heart" and "from where"; this is the art of tevriye (double entendre), which makes both senses of the same word work together. The wish that the arrow not rust from sorrow also shows that the lover describes his pain not as a complaint but with concern that the beloved's weapon stay bright.

In the third couplet the chin-dimple is likened to a well, and the tress to the rope with which one climbs out of the well. Kaya gives this couplet as an example in the section where she treats the images of the well (çâh) and the dungeon together. The story of the prophet Joseph, thrown without guilt into a well and then cast into prison, lies behind this double image, and the word "bî-güneh" (guiltless) in the couplet recalls that story. In the fourth couplet the word "oran" means measure; the beloved goes beyond the measure with coquetry. Kaya mentions this couplet among the examples in which cruelty and tyranny (cevir and cefa) produce reproach in the lover.

The fifth couplet rests on an old proverb: treasure is found in a ruin. The glance is a thief and finds in the ruined heart the treasure made of the beloved's image. Kaya notes that in the divan the glance (gamze) is mentioned as a thief only in this couplet. In the sixth couplet the glance and the tress "join heads", that is, unite and burn the city of hearts; Kaya illustrates with this couplet the idea that the eye, with the help of the glance, is an element that causes mischief and disturbs the lover's heart.

The seventh couplet likens the rival to Satan. According to Kaya, in the divan Satan is mostly used to describe the rival, who tries to lead the beloved astray; in this couplet, unlike the other examples, the poet says that Satan, that is, the rival, has led the lover himself astray. The connection between "elden çıḳardum" (I let her slip from my hand) and "îmândan çıḳar" (departs from faith) presents losing the beloved as a loss of faith and brings forward the idea that the road of love is the right road.

Historical Context

The last couplet of the ghazal is one of the clearest pieces of information the divan gives about Mihrî's family. The poet addresses herself as "Belâ-keş Mihrî" (Mihrî who endures calamity) and counts herself "of the line of Belâyî". Belâyî is the pen name her father used in his poems; using the connection between this name and the word "belâ" (calamity), the couplet builds a tevriye (double entendre): both "one whose father is Belâyî" and "one descended from a line of calamity" work together. That the faithless always find her is presented as the inheritance of this line.

In the introduction to his edition, Mehmet Arslan says that Mihrî's father was Kadı Hasan Amasyevî, who wrote poetry under the pen name Belâyî, cites the title "Dîvân-ı Mihrî Duhter-i Mevlânâ Belâyî" (Divan of Mihrî, daughter of Mevlânâ Belâyî) in two manuscripts of the divan (F and S), and, noting that Mihrî mentions her father's name explicitly in two places in the divan, points to this couplet and to the 425th couplet of the Tażarru‘-nâme. The TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (Encyclopaedia of Islam of the Turkish Religious Foundation) also gives the father's name in the same way and records that her grandfather was Pîr İlyas, one of the Halveti sheikhs. Gönül Ayan, on the other hand, gives Belâyî's real name as Mehmed Çelebi b. Yahya; that is, the father's real name appears differently in the sources, but they agree on the pen name Belâyî and on his judgeship. Kaya, too, mentions Belâyî through this couplet in the section where she examines personal names in the divan, and says that Mihrî, complaining of her ill fortune, mentions her father's name in connection with "belâ".

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, p. 70-71, Gazel 39 (F 37b, M 52b, S 39b, Ü 36a); introduction, p. 4. ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Academic studies

  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Divânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2010, p. 37, 69, 119, 157, 161, 163, 233. openaccess.firat.edu.tr
  • Sabiha Gemici, Mihrî Hatun Divanı: Karşılaştırmalı Metin, Cümle Yapısı ve Cümle Türleri, doctoral thesis, Uludağ Üniversitesi, Balıkesir 1990 (comparative text of the ghazal).

Books

  • İsmail E. Erünsal, "Mihrî Hatun", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 30, Ankara 2020, p. 37-38. islamansiklopedisi.org.tr
  • Gönül Ayan, "Mihri Hatun ve Şiirleri", Erdem V/13 (1989), p. 23-30.

Online sources