Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātü mefā‘īlü fā‘ilün

Yüzüñ çerāġına dil uzatdıysa cān-ı şem‘
Fī’l-ḥāl ölince şöyle ḳururdı zebān-ı şem‘
Zülfüñ fetīli yarasına baġrumuñ yeter
Dāġ-ı dile fetīl ise ger rīsmān-ı şem‘
Yüzüñ çerāġı medḥin oḳur bezm içinde kim
Altūn-ı ḫāliṣ ile ṭolupdur dehān-ı şem‘
Cān-ı ża‘īfe ḫande-i ḫışmuñdan irişür
Pervāneye n’iderse dil-i mihribān-ı şem‘
Cān virmeyince sırrumuz olmaz ‘ıyān Münīr
Lā-büd bilinmez olmasa dāġ-ı nihān-ı şem‘

In English

1. If the candle's soul (its flame) wagged its tongue at the lamp of your face (spoke insolently against it), then dying on the spot the candle's tongue would shrivel like this. (When a candle goes out, its wick blackens and dries.)

2. If the thread of the candle is to serve as a wick for the brands on the heart, then for the wound of my liver the wick of your lock is enough. (In former times a wick of lint was placed in a wound or a cauterized spot; the lock is likened to this wick.)

3. The candle that recites in the assembly the praise of the lamp of your face has its mouth filled with pure gold. (The candle's yellow flame is likened to gold stuffed into its mouth as a reward for its praise.)

4. From your angry smile there comes to the weak soul what the loving heart of the candle does to the moth. (The candle's "love" burns the moth; the beloved's smile touches the soul in the same way.)

5. Münîr, unless we give our life our secret does not come to light; if the candle did not (burn and melt away), its hidden brand would surely not be known. The couplet cannot be understood with certainty; our reading is an inference: the burn inside the candle is seen only when it melts and is used up, and the lover's secret too comes out only with his death.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet Turkish ghazal (gazel) and is the hundred and forty-fourth of the Turkish ghazals in the edition (tg 144). The metre is "mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātü mefā‘īlü fā‘ilün". The refrain (redif) is the phrase "-ı şem‘" (of the candle); the rhyme is the "-ān" sound: cān, zebān, rīsmān, dehān, mihribān and nihān. The number of this ghazal does not appear in the list of refrains in Ersoy's introduction; yet since every couplet ends with the word "şem‘", it is clear that the ghazal has a refrain. This is our own observation. According to Ersoy's count of rhyme letters, it is one of the three Turkish ghazals that rhyme in the letter ayn; the final letter of the rhyme is the same as that of the word "şem‘". The ghazal is found only in the Vienna manuscript (VY 166a); it is absent from the other two manuscripts and from the anthologies. Its folio number in the Vienna manuscript is far from the places of the neighbouring ghazals in the same manuscript (109b, 110a); the ghazal must stand in another section there. This is our own inference. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole ghazal is built on the image of the candle; each couplet takes up one part or feature of the candle: its soul, its tongue, its thread, its mouth, its heart and its hidden brand. The candle is thus personified like a human being, and the refrain renews this personification in every couplet.

In the opening couplet (matla) the candle's flame is likened to a tongue. The candle has "wagged its tongue" at the lamp of the beloved's face, that is, it has tried to rival it or has spoken against it; its punishment is to die and have its tongue shrivel. The blackened, curling wick of a candle that has gone out is the image of this dried-up tongue. Likening the flame to a tongue is a familiar simile in divan poetry; here, joined with the idiom "dil uzatmak" (to wag one's tongue at someone), it becomes a poetic aetiology (hüsn-i talil).

The second couplet recalls an old method of treatment. In the entry "fetil" of the Kubbealtı dictionary a couplet is cited in which the brand wound and the wick are mentioned together. The brands on the heart (burn wounds) may use the candle's thread as a wick, but for the wound in the lover's liver the beloved's thin, curling lock serves as the wick. There is a resemblance between lock and wick in fineness and curl.

In the third couplet the candle resembles a poet praising the beloved's face in the assembly; the reward for the praise is the gold stuffed into its mouth. The candle's yellow flame corresponds to this gold. We have not been able to verify from sources whether this comparison rests on a notion of filling an admired poet's mouth with gold; our reading is an inference.

The fourth couplet uses the motif of the candle and the moth in reverse. The candle's "mihribān" (loving) heart burns the moth; the beloved's angry smile does the same to the lover's soul. The phrase "ḫande-i ḫışm" (an angry smile) creates a contrast (tezat) between smile and anger. In the pen-name couplet (mahlas) the candle and the lover are paired once more: the secret of each comes to light only when it is used up.

Bibliography

Online sources