Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ûlü Fâ‘ilâtü Mefâ‘îlü Fâ‘ilün

Ne ḥüsnüm âfitâb u ne ḫod mâh gencidür
Ne ḳaşlarum kemân u ne zülfüm nişâncıdur
Bühtânlar eylemiş bize ra‘nâ deyü ḫaṭîb
Şâ‘irlerüñ birincisi ġâyet yalancıdur
Lâġ ile bûse istese bizden ‘aceb degül
Ṣaḳalı gülse her kişi iller gülencidür
Şimden girü Maḳâmî bizüm bûsemüz hemân
Yıllarla yürek aġrısı ishâl rencidür
Her âsitâna yüz süriyüp bûse cerr ider
Bu bâb içinde Mihrî de senden dilencidür

In English

1. My beauty is not the sun, nor is the moon its junior; my brows are not a bow, nor is my lock an archer (nişancı). (The praises in Makâmî's ghazal are rejected one by one. The word genci can be read as "the young one, the junior", or linked to Persian genc (treasure). Nişancı is both the court official who draws the sultan's monogram on imperial decrees and the archer who takes aim; with the word "bow" the second sense is heard too.)

2. The preacher has slandered us by calling us "lovely"; the foremost of the poets is exceedingly a liar. (Manuscripts M and Ü have "a good many" in place of "the foremost": a good many of the poets are exceedingly liars. Since Makâmî was a poet who had served as a preacher, he is called both "preacher" and "poet".)

3. It is no wonder that he asks us for a kiss in jest; but if everyone laughs at his beard, it is only fitting, for he is one the people laugh at and make sport of. (The couplet can be read in two ways: if gülenci is taken in the sense of "laughable, a figure of fun", it says that the bearded man who asks for a kiss will become a laughing-stock to the people; the phrase "if his beard laughs" may also describe his own laughter together with his beard.)

4. O Makâmî, from now on our kiss is simply a heartache, the affliction of a diarrhoea lasting years.

5. You rub your face on every threshold and beg for kisses; on this door, in this matter, Mihrî too is a beggar of yours. (The couplet can be read in two ways: the words senden dilencidür may be understood as "she begs something of you" or as "like you, she too is a beggar at this door". Bâb means both door and subject, topic.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal stands fifty-first in the Harfü'r-Râ section of the divan and has five couplets. It is written in the metre "Mef‘ûlü Fâ‘ilâtü Mefâ‘îlü Fâ‘ilün". The redif (refrain word) is the ending "-dur/-dür"; the rhyme rests on the sound "-ncı": gencidür, nişâncıdur, yalancıdur, gülencidür, rencidür, dilencidür. As will be explained below, this metre, rhyme and redif are the same as those of the ghazal Makâmî sent to Mihrî. The ghazal is found in all four manuscripts. In the divan's version, the addressee is named in the fourth couplet: "Şimden girü Maḳâmî…".

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal is an answer poem and draws its strength from the poem it answers. In Makâmî's ghazal the sun and moon are made subject to the beloved's beauty; the brow becomes a bow that makes the crescent jealous, and the lock an archer who draws the monogram on the deed of beauty. In her first couplet Mihrî repeats all these comparisons in negated form: neither sun nor moon, neither bow nor archer. The conceits that divan poetry uses to describe the beloved's beauty are here turned away by a woman poet for her own face. Kaya notes that in the divan the word "nişancı" is used for the lock only in this couplet, and that Mihrî is answering Makâmî here.

In the second couplet Mihrî reverses the phrase "do not think Makâmî a liar" from the last couplet of Makâmî's poem: the preacher who calls us lovely is slandering, and the foremost of the poets is exceedingly a liar. As Kaya notes, Mihrî addresses Makâmî in this exchange as both preacher and poet. The praise thus becomes the word of a eulogist accused of lying.

The fourth couplet is the most striking of the ghazal. Makâmî had said that the beloved's beauty mark, down, hair and lashes were "black pain" (kara sancı) to sick hearts. Mihrî answers in the language of illness too: from now on, her kiss will be a heartache, a diarrhoea affliction lasting years. Kaya records that in this ghazal Mihrî likens her kiss to the "affliction of diarrhoea". Tuğba Bıyık treats this expression among Mihrî's original word usages: in divan poetry the kiss is counted a favour of the beloved, and the lover endures every hardship to receive it; Mihrî takes the kiss out of this mould and links it with an unwelcome illness. According to Bıyık, in this ghazal Mihrî speaks of having grown old and, reproaching Makâmî for complimenting her as beautiful, says that her kiss has become something that would cause disgust.

In the last couplet the word "bâb" is a double entendre (tevriye): its near meaning is door, its far meaning subject. The words rubbing the face, threshold, begging for a kiss and door complete one another. Kaya takes this couplet as Mihrî's witty answer to the poet who asked her for a kiss.

Historical Context

Âşık Çelebi tells how the ghazal came to be written in the Makâmî entry of Meşâ‘irü'ş-Şu‘arâ. According to this account, Makâmî came from the city of Siroz (today's Serres); he took the pen name "Makâmî" because he knew the modes (makam) and melodies well. He served as a preacher in some places, became imam to Prince Ahmed, then taught the palace pages, and taught the Qur'an and music to the sons of İbrâhim Paşa and İskender Çelebi. He died during the conquest of Baghdad, on the Persian campaign. According to Âşık Çelebi's record, Makâmî was a contemporary of Mihrî, and the two were conversation companions at Sultan Ahmed's door. Makâmî sent Mihrî a ghazal "in the style of üzilmek", as Âşık Çelebi puts it, literally "in the manner of grieving", with the air of a complaining lover. Mehmet Arslan too counts Makâmî among the poets present at the prince's palace in Amasya.

Âşık Çelebi gives this ghazal as five couplets. Its first couplet is: "Ḥüsnüñdür âftâb anuñ mâh gencidür / Ḳaddin mehüñ hilâl iden ebruñ rencidür." That is: the sun is your beauty, the moon is its junior; what bends the moon's figure into a crescent is the trouble your brow gives it. In the fourth couplet Makâmî names the beloved by playing on the word mihr (love, sun): "Mihrî ‘aceb mi mihrüñi sînemde ṣaḳlasam" (O Mihrî, is it any wonder if I keep your love in my breast). In his last couplet he says he has vowed to give his life in return for a kiss: "Ṣun leblerüñi ṣanma Maḳâmî yalancıdur" (Offer your lips; do not think Makâmî a liar). After this Âşık Çelebi gives Mihrî's reply under the heading "Cevâb-ı Mihrî" (Mihrî's Reply). In the tezkire (biographical anthology of poets) the reply has three couplets and corresponds to the first, fourth and fifth couplets of the ghazal in the divan; there the first line reads "Ḥüsnüm ne âftâb ne ḫod mâh gencidür". The second and third couplets of the divan do not appear in the tezkire.

Immediately after the reply, Âşık Çelebi says "this ghazal too is his" and gives another ghazal beginning "Dürişdüm dil-berâ ‘ışḳuñda yavlaḳ"; manuscript F gives this ghazal the heading "cevâb-ı Maḳâmî" (Makâmî's reply). This ghazal is not found in Mihrî's divan, and whose it is is not clear. At the end of Arslan's edition there is also a 21-couplet poem found only in manuscript Ü, which according to the editor's note was written to Mihrî by Makâmî (or Makâlî). These records carry the traces of a poetic exchange between the two poets in Prince Ahmed's circle at Amasya.

The ghazal shows Mihrî's stance toward the praise of male poets. Mihrî, praised as the beloved in Makâmî's poem, speaks in her own voice in her reply, rejects the praises one by one in the same rhyme and redif, and turns away the poet who asked for a kiss in a mocking tone. That Âşık Çelebi gives the two poems side by side also shows that this exchange was remembered in the literary circles of the time.

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