Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Nice feryâda vara nâlelerüm âh saña
Nice bir ‘arż ideyüm ḥâlümi her gâh saña
İşidüp bülbül-i şeydâ meger âh-ı seḥerüm
Çaġırup derd ile dir âh beni vâh saña
Ḥüsn sermâyesi elden gidicek bir gün ola
Bildüre itdügüñi sevdügüm Allâh saña
Gün yüzüñ burc-ı şeref üzre ṭulû‘ itdügiçün
Giceler ṣubḥa degin ṭaña ḳalur mâh saña
Ḫâk ider ġayret odı bu dil-i miskîni yaḳup
Bile yanuñca raḳîb olalı hem-râh saña
Nice sengîn-dil imişsin ki es̱er itmedi hîç
‘Āşıḳ-ı şûrîdeler âhı seḥer-gâh saña
Nev-cüvân itdi Zelîḫâ gibi Mihrî seni ‘aşḳ
Ḳılalı luṭf ile Yûsuf-naẓarın şâh saña

In English

1. Ah, how long will my laments reach you as a cry? How long, at every moment, shall I lay my condition before you?

2. The mad nightingale must have heard my sigh at dawn, for it cries out in pain, "Woe to me, alas for you." (In the Ü manuscript "hey" instead of "beni".)

3. My beloved, the capital of your beauty will one day leave your hands. On that day may God make known to you what you have done. (Beauty is likened to capital that is used up as it is spent.)

4. Because your sun-like face was born in the sign of exaltation, the moon, through the nights until morning, stands amazed at you. (Taña kalmak means to be left astonished; since it also recalls the word tan, "dawn", it links with the words about morning. In old astronomy the "sign of exaltation" is the sign in which a star is strongest.)

5. Since the rival has been your travelling companion at your side, the fire of jealousy burns this poor heart and turns it to earth.

6. How stony-hearted you must be, that the sighs of the distraught lovers at dawn have never moved you.

7. O Mihrî, since the king showed favour and looked with the glance of Joseph, love has made you young again like Zulaykha. (According to the story, Zulaykha, who had grown old, became young again through the prayer of Joseph.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The sixth ghazal of the divan has seven couplets and is written in the pattern "Fe'ilâtün Fe'ilâtün Fe'ilâtün Fe'ilün" of the remel metre. The redif (refrain word) is "saña" (to you), and the rhyme is the sound "-âh": âh, gâh, vâh, Allâh, mâh, hem-râh, seḥer-gâh, şâh. The two hemistichs of the first couplet rhyme, and the poem follows the familiar order of the ghazal verse form. The poem is in all four manuscripts. The Ü manuscript differs from the others in many words; for example, in the sixth couplet it reads "'Āşıḳı şûrîdenüñ" instead of "'Āşıḳ-ı şûrîdeler". For whom it was written is not known.

The ghazal bears the same metre, rhyme and redif as the fifth ghazal that comes directly before it in the divan. Some expressions appear in both poems: "ḥâlümi 'arż itmek" (to lay my condition before you), "her gâh", "seḥer-gâh", "hem-râh" and "ġayret odı" (the fire of jealousy). The most marked common feature is in the pen-name couplet. In the fifth ghazal it is said as a wish that Mihrî will become young like Zulaykha if the king looks with the glance of Joseph; in this ghazal the rejuvenation has taken place: "Nev-cüvân itdi Zelîḫâ gibi Mihrî seni 'aşḳ". The reason for the closeness of the two ghazals is not explained in the sources.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem opens with the complaint of a lover who has been left without an answer. In the first couplet cry, lament and sigh come together; the lover asks how much longer she will lay her condition before the beloved. In the second couplet this sigh reaches the nightingale. In divan poetry the nightingale is the bird that falls in love with the rose and sings until morning; here, hearing the lover's sigh at dawn, it too is pained and cries "woe to me, alas for you". The nightingale's joining the lover is a find that can be counted both as personification (teşhis) and as hüsn-i talil (the invention of a fair cause): the nightingale's song is explained by its sharing the lover's pain.

The third couplet is a warning to the beloved. Beauty is imagined as capital, and one day it will leave her hands. It is wished that on that day God make known to the beloved what she has done; the couplet has a harsh manner of speech lying between a curse and advice. In the fourth couplet the tone changes and praise is made with images of the heavens. The beloved's sun-like face was born in the sign of exaltation; the moon stands amazed at her through the nights until morning. The idiom "ṭaña ḳalmak" (to be left astonished), read together with the phrase "ṣubḥa degin" (until morning) in the same line, also brings to mind the word "tan" (dawn); this play of sound and meaning strengthens the tenasüp formed by the words night, morning, sun and moon in the couplet.

In the sixth couplet the beloved is called "sengîn-dil", that is, stony-hearted. Kaya cites this couplet among the places in the divan where the beloved's faithlessness and cruelty are dwelt on, where she is called stony-hearted and the lover's weeping and lamenting do not help. The dawn hour is in divan poetry the time at which the lover sighs most at the end of a sleepless night; that this sigh, which should be able to pierce even stone, has no effect on the beloved describes her hardness in an exaggerated way.

In the last couplet an allusion is made to the story of Joseph and Zulaykha. According to the account given in the TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, Zulaykha, who had grown old and blind, became young again through Joseph's prayer and married him. Kaya notes that in nearly all the couplets of the divan in which the name Zulaykha appears the words "nev-cüvân" (young) or "pîr" (old) are used, that Zulaykha, aged by love for Joseph, is made young again by Joseph's glance, and she gives this couplet as an example. Here Mihrî puts herself in the place of Zulaykha and the beloved in that of Joseph. Considering the tone of complaint in the rest of the poem, the rejuvenation in the last couplet can be read as the joy of union, or understood as a recollection that sets itself against the reproaches at the beginning of the poem.

Bibliography

Primary sources

Academic studies

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