Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Leblerüñi gördügümce dostum cân imrenür
Yalıñuz bir ben miyem kâfir müselmân imrenür
Göreli zülfüñ şebinde yüzüñüñ envârını
Çarḫ ser-gerdân olupdur mâh-ı tâbân imrenür
Serv-ḳaddüñ nâz ile seyr itdügince bâġda
Her yaña aġzı ṣuy'aḳar aña bustân imrenür
Bâġ-ı ḥüsnüñde ṣabâ depretdügince zülfüñi
Ġoncalar ḫandân olup zülfüñe reyḥân imrenür
Düşmişem çâh-ı zenaḫdânuña gerçi râḥatam
Ḥamdü-lillâh ḥâlüme her ehl-i zindân imrenür
Ḥoḳḳa-i yâḳût içre billah ol dür-dâneye
Kim ola cân virmeye ol baḥre her kân imrenür
Derdini derdine dermân idinelden dilberüñ
Mihrî'nüñ her vechile derdine dermân imrenür

In English

1. My friend, whenever the soul sees your lips, it envies them. Am I the only one? The unbeliever envies, and so does the Muslim.

2. Since it saw the radiance of your face in the night of your hair, the firmament has gone about dizzy; the shining moon envies you too. (Ser-gerdân means both "dizzy, bewildered" and "constantly revolving"; the turning of the heavens is made to seem born of admiration for the beloved.)

3. Whenever your cypress stature strolls coquettishly in the garden, the garden's mouth waters on every side; the orchard envies it. ("One's mouth waters" is an idiom for envy; the waters running in every direction through the garden are tied to this idiom.)

4. Whenever the morning breeze stirs your hair in the garden of your beauty, the buds laugh and open, and basil envies your locks. (The beloved's hair is likened to basil for its sweet scent.)

5. I have fallen into the well of your chin, yet I am at ease; thanks be to God, every prisoner envies my state. (The well the lover has fallen into is the dimple in the beloved's chin; the words well and prison also recall the story of the Prophet Joseph.)

6. By God, who would not give his life for that pearl within the ruby casket? Every mine envies the sea from which that pearl came. (Red lips are likened to a casket of ruby and the teeth to a pearl. Ruby comes from the mine and the pearl from the sea; the mines' envy of the sea expresses the value of the pearl that comes out of it. The second line of the couplet is obscure and can be understood in other ways.)

7. Since Mihrî made the pain the beauty gave her the remedy for her own pain, even the remedy envies Mihrî's pain in every respect.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal stands forty-ninth in the Harfü'r-Râ section of the divan and has seven couplets. It is written in the remel metre in the pattern "Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is "imrenür" ("envies"); the rhyme rests on the sound "-ân": cân, müselmân, tâbân, bustân, reyhân, zindân, kân, dermân. The ghazal is found in all four manuscripts; manuscripts F, M and S read "ḥüsnüñüñ" in place of "yüzüñüñ" in the second couplet. It is not known for whom it was written.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The basic design of the ghazal is that everyone and everything envies the beloved's beauty. The poet lists those who envy, couplet by couplet: the human soul, the unbeliever and the Muslim, the moon and the firmament, the garden, the buds and basil, the inmates of the prison, the mines, and finally the remedy. A sequence thus emerges that runs from people to heavenly bodies and from plants to minerals. The beloved's beauty is shown to stand above both religious divisions and every level of nature. In the first couplet there is an antithesis between "unbeliever and Muslim".

In the second couplet the comparison of hair to night and face to moon turns, this time, into an exaggeration that makes the moon itself jealous. Kaya notes that in Mihrî's divan the beloved's beauty is the sun by day and the moon by night, and that the full moon, seeing the radiance of the face in the night of the lock, envies this beauty. That the firmament is "ser-gerdân" comes close to the figure hüsn-i talil (fanciful explanation), since a cause born of admiration is given for the heavens' constant turning.

The third couplet rests on a play on an idiom. Kaya records that in this couplet the traditional relation between cypress and water joins with the idiom "one's mouth waters". The garden is likened to someone whose mouth waters on seeing the beloved's cypress stature; the reality of the waters running through the garden and the figurative sense of the idiom meet in the same words. In the fourth couplet the words morning breeze, bud and basil form a congruence of images (tenasüp) belonging to the spring garden; that the bud is "ḫandân" means both that it opens and that it laughs.

The fifth couplet works the chin-dimple conceit that divan poetry loved. According to Kaya, the chin, because of its hollow and because it is where the lover's heart falls, is called "çâh-ı zenahdân" (the well of the chin); the lover is a captive in this well, with the thread of the beloved's lock tied around his neck. That the lover says he is at ease in this well and that the prisoners envy his state is a manner of speaking that reverses the expected pain. In the sixth couplet there is again a congruence of images among ruby, pearl, sea and mine. In the pen-name couplet a wordplay is made by repeating "derd" (pain) and "derman" (remedy): the lover has made pain her remedy, and the remedy has come to envy her pain. The redif thus finds its most unexpected subject in the last couplet.

Bibliography

Online sources