Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Vezin: Mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün

MetāꜤ-ı vaṣlını Ꜥuşşāḳa cānān rāyegān itmiş
Bu bāzār içre ol bī-çārelerse naḳd-i cān [itmiş]
Ṣabāveş zülf-i cānāna keder itmiş nesīm-i āh
Şikenc-i ṭurraya ol rūyuna girmiş mekān [itmiş]
Gülistān-ı cemāliñ seyr iderken bülbül-i nā-şād
Görüp ḫār ile ülfet itdigin ġāyet fiġān [itmiş]
Hedef-āsā derūnumda[ki] zaḫmları ḥesāb oldı
Ki zīrā bize cevrini o şūḫumdur gümān [itmiş]
Teni vīrāneñi Mihrī gelüp o şāh-ı ḥüsn size
Diliñ küncine sīne gevher-i Ꜥaşḳıñ nihān itmiş

In English

1. The beloved has made the goods of union free for lovers; but in this bazaar those helpless ones have paid for it with their lives, as ready cash.

2. The breeze of my sigh, like the dawn wind, has troubled and dishevelled the beloved's tresses; it has entered the curl of the forelock and made a home on the beloved's face. (The lover's sigh is likened to the dawn wind that stirs the beloved's hair.)

3. The joyless nightingale, while gazing at the rose garden of your beauty, saw the rose keeping company with the thorn and lamented greatly. (The nightingale is the lover, the rose the beloved, the thorn the rival.)

4. Like a target, the wounds within me have come to be counted; for that frolicsome beloved of mine has deemed her cruelty fit for us. (The second line is not clear; it can also be understood as "she supposed she would direct her cruelty at us alone.")

5. Mihrî, that king of beauty has come and hidden the jewel of love in your ruined body, in the corner of your heart. (The words "size" and "sīne" in the lines blur the meaning; the essence of the couplet is the idea of a treasure hidden in a ruin.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The ghazal is not found in Mihrî Hatun's divan. It appears on folio 57b of the poetry miscellany numbered 43 Va 2871 in the Kütahya Vahid Paşa Provincial Public Library and was published by Mutlu Muhammet Aktaş in 2023. Aktaş found many clues suggesting that the ghazals under the pen name Mihrî in the miscellany belong to Mihrî Hatun, but states that these do not suffice for a firm judgment. The ghazal can therefore be attributed to Mihrî Hatun only as a possibility. There is no information about for whom it was written.

The ghazal has five couplets and is written in the hezec metre, in the pattern "mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün mefā’īlün". The refrain is "itmiş" and the rhyme is the "-ân" sound: rāyegān, cān, mekān, fiġān, gümān, nihān. Because the miscellany is worn, the refrain in the second lines of the first four couplets has been completed in the edition within square brackets. That the refrain is formed with the suffix "-miş" gives the couplets the air of narrating an event heard from another or noticed afterwards.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The first couplet sets up a bazaar scene. Union is put out in the bazaar like merchandise (metāʻ), and the beloved hands it out free (rāyegān); but the lovers pay for this free merchandise with their lives, as ready cash (naḳd). Among the words "metāʻ", "rāyegān", "bāzār" and "naḳd" there is a clear congruence of images (tenasüp); that what is called free is bought at the highest price makes up the irony of the couplet. Aktaş notes in particular that the compound "metāʻ-ı vaṣl" occurs both in this miscellany and in Mihrî Hatun's divan, and that it is an expression rarely met in classical poetry. This commonality is one of the clues cited in favour of the ghazal's belonging to Mihrî.

In the second couplet the lover's sigh is likened to the sabâ wind that blows at dawn and stirs the beloved's hair. The wind enters the curl of the tress and makes a home on the beloved's face; the sigh's reaching the beloved is its arriving where the lover himself cannot. The third couplet uses the well-known divan triad of rose, nightingale and thorn. Gülşen Kaya notes that in Mihrî's divan the thorn is thought of as the rival beside the rose; and the nightingale laments on seeing the rose keep company with the thorn. Here the direct address to the beloved with the word "cemāliñ" ties the garden picture to the lover's own pain.

In the fourth couplet the lover's heart is likened to a target, and the wounds on it have come to be counted. As Kaya shows, in Mihrî's divan the beloved's lashes and glances are likened to arrows aimed at the lover's heart; the expression "hedef-āsā" rests on this conception, but the arrow is not named.

The last couplet rests on the idea of a treasure hidden in a ruin. The lover's body is a ruin, and the king of beauty has come and hidden the jewel of love in this ruin, that is, in a corner of the heart. Kaya gives an example from Mihrî's divan of a couplet that regards beauty as a treasure and says the beloved keeps the jewel of this treasure in the lover's ruined heart: "Genc-i ḥüsnüñ cevherin ṣaḳlar dil-i vîrân aña" (Fourth kaside, couplet 6). The couplet in the miscellany repeats this thought in nearly the same words. The compound "genc-i ḥüsn" that Aktaş finds common to the divan and the miscellany also belongs to the same circle of motifs. Because the text of the couplet is corrupt, the details are not certain, but the main idea is clear: a body that looks ruined is the place that hides a precious jewel such as love.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Mehmet Arslan (ed.), Mihrî Hâtun Dîvânı, Ankara: Republic of Turkey Ministry of Culture and Tourism Publications (Cultural Works Series 576), 2018, Kaside 4.

Academic studies

  • Mutlu Muhammet Aktaş, "Mihrî Hatun'un Yayımlanmamış Gazelleri", Hikmet-Akademik Edebiyat Dergisi 9/18 (Spring 2023), pp. 105-126, doi:10.28981/hikmet.1200789; ghazal 8 (Kütahya Vahid Paşa Provincial Public Library 43 Va 2871, fol. 57b), pp. 116-117; shared compounds p. 111; evaluation pp. 110-112.
  • Gülşen Kaya, Mihrî Hâtun Divânı'nın Tahlili, master's thesis, Fırat University Institute of Social Sciences, Elazığ 2010, pp. 126, 134, 159-163. openaccess.firat.edu.tr

Online sources