Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ûlü Mefâ‘îlü Mefâ‘îlü Fa‘ûlün

‘Aşḳ âteşine yanıcı pervânelerüz biz
Bu âteşe per yaḳmayıcaḳ yâ nelerüz biz
Nûş eylemişüz rûz-ı ezel câmını ‘aşḳuñ
Tâ ḥaşre dek ol şevḳ ile mestânelerüz biz
Var ḫân-ḳahı bekle riyâ ile sen ey şeyḫ
S̱âbit-ḳademüz sâkin-i mey-ḫânelerüz biz
‘Āḳil ḳomazuz ḫûblaruñ elden ölünce
Zencîr-i ser-i zülfini dîvânelerüz biz
Rüsvâlıġımuz ḫalḳ-ı cihân bildi ne ġam çün
Gûş eylemezüz nâṣiḥi rindânelerüz biz
Meydânına ‘aşḳuñ bugün iḫlâṣ ile girdük
Baş oynayıcı bir nice merdânelerüz biz
Ey dost raḳîb ile ṭurup ṣoḥbet idersin
‘Uşşâḳlaruz çün yine bîgânelerüz biz
Ḳılmaḳ diler iseñ dil-i vîrâneyi ma‘mûr
Gel göñlümüzi yap ḳatı vîrânelerüz biz
Terk-i dil ü cân itmeyicek dost yolında
Ey Mihrî nice ṭâlib-i cânânelerüz biz

In English

1. We are moths burning in the fire of love; if we are not to burn our wings in this fire, what are we?

2. On the day of pre-eternity we drank the cup of love; we are drunk with that ardour until the Day of Judgment. (Rûz-ı ezel: the first day, when souls were created and said "yes" to God.)

3. O sheikh, go and keep your lodge with hypocrisy; we are the firm-footed (those who do not go back on their word) dwellers of the tavern.

4. Until we die we will not stay sensible in the hands of beauties; we are madmen chained by the tip of their tresses. (Madmen used to be put in chains; curling hair is likened to this chain. In manuscript Ü "‘Āḳil" is replaced by "Ġâfil"; then the first line says "we do not leave the beauties heedless until they die." The couplet can be understood with both readings.)

5. The whole world has learned of our disgrace, what of it; for we are persons of rend temperament who pay no heed to the counsellor.

6. Today we have entered the arena of love in sincerity; we are a few brave men who put their heads at stake.

7. O friend, you sit and converse with the rival; we are lovers, yet we are still strangers.

8. If you wish to make a ruined heart flourish, come and mend our heart; we are very ruined. ("Gönül yapmak" means to console, to put someone at ease; the couplet uses this idiom together with the sense of "repairing a ruined building.")

9. O Mihrî, how could we be seekers of the beloved unless we give up heart and soul on the friend's road?

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The sixty-first ghazal (gazel) of the divan has nine couplets (beyit) and is composed in the aruz (quantitative metre) pattern "Mef‘ûlü Mefâ‘îlü Mefâ‘îlü Fa‘ûlün". The rhyme is the sound "-âne" (pervâne, mestâne, mey-ḫâne, dîvâne, rindâne, merdâne, bîgâne, vîrâne, cânâne), and the redif (refrain word) is "-lerüz biz". In the second line of the opening couplet the rhyme is completed in an interesting way with the words "yâ nelerüz biz": "pervâne" and "yâ ne" match in sound. In Sıtkı Nazik's redif list this ghazal appears together with ghazal 56, which carries the same redif "biz". The ghazal is found in all four manuscripts (F 46b, M 66b, S 48b, Ü 41a); in Havlioğlu's OTAP text it is ghazal 63. It is not known to whom it was addressed.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal is a poem in which a community of lovers speaking as "we" introduces itself; each couplet adds an attribute to this community: moths, drunkards, dwellers of the tavern, madmen, rends, brave men, strangers, the ruined. In the section where she treats the lover type in its Sufi dimension in Mihrî's divan, Gülşen Kaya summarizes the picture of the first couplets: the lover is a moth burning in the fire of love, and one who does not burn his wings in this fire has no worth; he drank from the cup of love on the day of pre-eternity and is drunk with this love until the Day of Judgment; he is among the brave who have entered the arena of love with sincerity.

"Rûz-ı ezel" in the second couplet is an allusion to the day of the creation of souls and to the answer given to God's question "Am I not your Lord?" Kaya cites this couplet in her entry on the Day of Judgment and says that Mihrî used Sufism for artistic purposes rather than being a Sufi poet, but that, having been raised within the tradition of divan poetry, she gives place here and there to Sufi expressions, and that this couplet is one of them. The third and fifth couplets rest on the opposition between the rend and the ascetic (zâhid). In her entry on the rend, Kaya notes that Mihrî regards herself as a rend, and that against the coarse pietists who keep the lodges with hypocrisy she says that the dwellers of the tavern are "sâbit-ḳadem" (firm-footed), and she gives the fifth couplet as an example of this stance. The opposition between "ḫân-ḳah" (lodge) and "mey-ḫâne" (tavern) is a well-known example of the device of tezat (antithesis).

The sixth couplet thinks of love as an arena of heroes. Kaya gives this couplet in three separate places; in her entry on the arena (meydan) she says that love is conceived as an arena in which lovers put their heads at stake. "Baş oynamak" is an old idiom meaning to risk one's head; there is a tenasüp (congruence of images) among the words "meydân", "baş oynayıcı" and "merdâne". In the fourth couplet hair and chain, and chain and madness, are brought together; in the seventh the lovers count themselves "bîgâne," that is, strangers, before the beloved's conversation with the rival. The eighth couplet joins the idiom "gönül yapmak" to an architectural comparison: whoever wishes to rebuild a ruined heart should turn to the most ruined heart, that is, the lover's.

The closing couplet makes all these attributes conditional: one who does not give up heart and soul on the friend's road cannot be counted a seeker of the beloved. The expression "terk-i dil ü cân" recalls the answer "cânânı gerek cânı gerekmez" in the sixth couplet of ghazal 59.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları (Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 576), 2018, p. 83, Ghazal 61 (F 46b, M 66b, S 48b, Ü 41a). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Academic studies

  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Divânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2010, pp. 28, 46, 54, 201, 240 (entries on the Day of Judgment, the Sufi lover type, the rend, types of lovers and the arena). 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, p. 137 (table of redifs in Mihrî's divan: "biz", G.56, G.61).

Books

  • Didem Havlioğlu (ed.), Ġazeliyyât-ı Mihrî-i Ḥaḳîre, OTAP electronic edition, ghazal 63 (text published on the türkoloji-iran page, 2007).

Online sources