Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün

Her ḳılında ṣaçuñuñ dil kim ider nāle hezār
Şāḫ-ı serv üzre uşup ṭut ki ḳılur zemzeme sār
Sīneme ḫayl-i ḫayālüñ gele diyü giceler
Ṣubḥ olunca bu göñül her şeb olur meş‘ale-dār
Ġonca-i lāle ki gül-şende bu vech ile ṭurur
La‘lden ḥoḳḳa ṭurur ṭut ki ṭolu müşk-i Tatār
Berg-i vaṣluñdan irişe de ṭutam berk diyü
Her ṭarafda açup avcunı ṭurur dest-i çenār
‘Aḳluñı başuña dir gözle reh-i ‘ışḳı Münīr
Eksük olmaz saña yār olur iseñ sen saña yār

In English

1. In every strand of your hair the heart moans a thousand times (like a nightingale); suppose a starling has alighted on a cypress branch and is twittering. ("Hezār" means both a thousand and nightingale; "sār" is the starling.)

2. Saying "let the train of your image come to my breast", this heart becomes a torch-bearer every night until morning comes. (The lover's burning heart is like the torch that lights the way for a guest coming by night.)

3. The tulip bud standing thus in the rose garden is, suppose, a casket made of ruby, full of Tatar musk. (The red petals of the tulip recall the casket, and its dark centre the musk.)

4. Saying "should a leaf (a share) of your union come my way, let me hold it fast", the hand of the plane tree stands with its palm open on every side. ("Berg" means leaf and "berk" means fast, firm; there is a play on sound between them.)

5. Münîr, gather your wits into your head and keep watch over the path of love; if you become a friend to yourself, you will not lack a friend. The couplet can be read in two ways: it may also be understood as "if you become a friend to yourself, you will lack nothing".

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet Turkish ghazal (gazel) and is the hundred and twenty-first of the Turkish ghazals in the edition (tg 121). The metre is "fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün". The ghazal has no refrain (redif) and does not appear in Ersoy's list of refrains; the rhyme is the "-ār" sound: hezār, sār, meş‘ale-dār, Tatār, çenār and yār. The ghazal is found in two manuscripts of the divan (VT 126a, VY 92a); the apparatus records no variant readings. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal gives a garden scene and a night scene one after the other. In the opening couplet (matla) the beloved's hair is likened to a cypress branch and the heart to a bird singing on that branch. The word "hezār" means both "a thousand" and nightingale; the heart's moaning "a thousand times" is at the same time a moaning like a nightingale. "Sār" in the second line is the starling. That the word suggesting the nightingale in the first line turns into another bird in the second gives the couplet liveliness; this observation is our own. The likeness between the long hair and the cypress branch rests on the length and curl of the hair.

In the second couplet there is a night-long wait. The lover waits for the beloved's image to arrive like a mounted train, and his heart holds a torch until morning. "Ḫayl" means a troop of horsemen, a train; the torch-bearer is the servant who lights the way at night. The heart is thus conceived as a servant receiving the train of a lord; this reading is our own inference.

The third couplet likens the tulip bud to a jewel casket. "Ḥoḳḳa" means a small casket and is also used in divan poetry for the beloved's mouth. The red outer petals of the tulip are a casket of ruby, and its dark centre an inside full of Tatar musk. In the fourth couplet the hand-shaped leaves of the plane tree are likened to open palms waiting for a share of union. There is a pun (cinas) between "berg" (leaf) and "berk" (fast, firm); Münîrî's fondness for the pun shows here too.

The pen-name couplet is a piece of advice. The expression "‘Aḳluñı başuña dir" corresponds to the idiom "aklını başına almak (veya toplamak veya devşirmek)" (to gather one's wits into one's head), which the dictionary of the Turkish Language Association records in the sense of "to save oneself from acting foolishly"; the verb "dirmek" in the couplet means "to gather, collect". The phrase "sen saña yār" at the end of the second line is obscure and can be understood in two ways. The use of the word "yār" twice in the same line forms a figure of repetition (tekrir).

Bibliography

Online sources