Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün fe‘ūlün

İñen ‘uşşāḳa ḳıyma ḳan ḳonulmaz
Ṭutalum kim bugün saña ṭınulmaz
Ṣaḳınġıl dest-bāzī ḳılma ey dil
Ṭurunc-ı ġabġab-ı yāra ṣunulmaz
Naẓar ḳılmaz baña ‘ışḳ āteşiyle
Temāşādan egerçi uṣanulmaz
Çün atduñ ġamzeñ oḳın ṭınma bārī
Bilürsin çıḳsa oḳ yaydan dönülmez
Münīrī mihr-i yāri gizleme hīc
Güneş ḫod balçıġ ile örtünülmez

In English

1. Do not destroy lovers so much; blood is not left (unavenged). Let us suppose that today no one can raise a voice against you. ("Ḳan ḳonulmaz", blood is not left, says that spilt blood will not go unanswered; "ṭınulmaz" means that no one can make a sound against you.)

2. O heart, beware, do not play with your hands; no hand is stretched out to the bitter orange of the beloved's double chin. ("Ġabġab" is the fullness beneath the chin; its roundness is likened to the bitter orange.)

3. Although one never tires of gazing, he does not look at me, (burning) with the fire of love. The couplet can be read in two ways: "with the fire of love" may describe the lover's state, or it may say that the beloved does not look because of the fire of love.

4. Since you have shot the arrow of your glance, at least make no sound (do not deny it); you know, once the arrow has left the bow there is no turning back.

5. Münîrî, do not hide the beloved's sun (love) at all; the sun cannot be covered with mud anyway.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet Turkish ghazal (gazel) and is the hundred and twenty-eighth of the Turkish ghazals in the edition (tg 128). The metre is "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün fe‘ūlün". Ersoy's list of refrains gives this ghazal the refrain (redif) "-UlmAz"; this is the negative passive verbal suffix ("cannot be ...-ed"), which appears by vowel harmony as "-ulmaz" or "-ülmez". The rhyme is the "-n" sound before it: ḳon, ṭın, ṣun, uṣan, dön and örtün. The ghazal is found in two manuscripts of the divan (VT 128a, VY 107b); the apparatus records no variant readings. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The refrain of the ghazal expresses a prohibition or an impossibility: is not left, cannot be answered, is not stretched out, is never tired of, cannot be turned back, cannot be covered. Each couplet ends with a general judgement, and some of these judgements rest on popular sayings. The TDV article notes that Münîrî was successful in the tradition of setting proverbs and idioms into poetry; this ghazal is a dense example.

In the fourth and fifth couplets two popular sayings are plainly seen. The dictionary of the Turkish Language Association records the idiom "ok yaydan (veya yayından) çıkmak" (the arrow leaves the bow) in the sense of "to do something that cannot be undone"; the phrase "çıḳsa oḳ yaydan dönülmez" in the fourth couplet is a form of this idiom. The beloved's glance is an arrow; once the arrow is shot it cannot be taken back, and the beloved should not deny what he has done. The fifth couplet rests on the saying "güneş balçıkla sıvanmaz" (the sun cannot be plastered over with mud); the dictionary records it in the sense of "a truth everyone knows cannot be denied". The poet has fitted the saying to the refrain in the form "örtünülmez" (cannot be covered) and joined it with the double meaning of "mihr", both sun and love: the love felt for the beloved is like the sun and cannot be hidden. The relation of these two couplets to popular sayings is our own observation.

The phrase "ḳan ḳonulmaz" in the opening couplet (matla) also recalls a popular expression: spilt blood is not left on the ground, it is avenged. We could not find this expression in this form in a dictionary; we have inferred its meaning from the context. "Ṭınulmaz" in the second line suggests that today no one can raise a voice against the beloved, but that this will not last.

In the second couplet the beloved's double chin is likened to a bitter orange. The bitter orange (turunç) is a somewhat sour fruit resembling the orange; "dest-bāzī" means playing with the hands, a hand jest. Stretching out a hand to the orange means attempting to touch the beloved, and this is forbidden. The third couplet concerns looking: one never tires of gazing at the beloved, yet the beloved does not look at the lover. There is a congruence of images (tenasüp) around the idea of looking between "naẓar" (glance) and "temāşā" (gazing).

Bibliography

Primary sources

Academic studies

Official sources

  • Türk Dil Kurumu, Güncel Türkçe Sözlük, entries "ok yaydan (veya yayından) çıkmak", "güneş balçıkla sıvanmaz" and "turunç". https://sozluk.gov.tr/

Online sources