Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fe‘ūlün fe‘ūlün fe‘ūlün fe‘ūl

Gerekse vefā ḳıl gerekse cefā
Ne dirseñ muṭī‘am sözüm yok şehā
Baña tā ki irüşdügi seg raḳīb
Kişi görmez olur gelicek ḳażā
Yetişürem āḫirde ol serve ben
Getürürse rāstına ey dil Ḫudā
Ser-i zülf-i yār ile seyr itmege
Seḥer-geh yetişür nesīm-i ṣabā
Ne deñlü cefā çekdüñ ise Münīr
Unut gitsün anı meżā mā meżā

In English

1. Show faithfulness or show cruelty, as you will; O king, whatever you say, I obey, I have no word to say.

2. That the dog-like rival came upon me is like a stroke of fate; when fate arrives, a man's eyes no longer see.

3. O heart, if God makes my affair come out straight, in the end I too shall reach that cypress (the beloved of cypress-like stature).

4. At the hour of dawn the morning breeze arrives there, to stroll together with the tip of the beloved's tresses.

5. O Münîr, however much cruelty you have suffered, forget it, let it go; what is past is past ("meżā mā meżā").

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet Turkish ghazal (gazel) and is the sixth of the Turkish ghazals in the edition (tg 6). The metre is "fe‘ûlün fe‘ûlün fe‘ûlün fe‘ûl". The ghazal has no refrain (redif); the rhyme is the sound "-ā": cefā, şehā, ḳażā, Ḫudā, ṣabā, meżā. The ghazal does not appear in the list of refrains in Ersoy's introduction either. The poem is found in the Vatican (VT 100a) and Vienna (VY 80b) manuscripts; the Vienna manuscript has another word in place of "şehā" in the opening couplet, but since the special letters in the footnote could not be printed, this reading cannot be seen in full. The pen name appears in the last couplet in the form "Münīr". To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The subject of the ghazal is the lover's complete surrender to the beloved and to fate. In the opening couplet (matla) "vefā" (faithfulness) and "cefā" (cruelty) face each other; for the lover no difference remains between the two, and he obeys whatever the beloved says. The word "muṭī‘" in its dictionary sense means one who obeys, and the address to the beloved as "şehā" (O king) shows that love is set up as a relation between a ruler and a servant.

In the second couplet the rival is called "seg", that is, a dog; this is an insult often used for the rival in divan poetry. The second half of the line rests on the saying known among the people, meaning "when fate arrives, the eye no longer sees", and so the couplet uses a proverb (irsal-i mesel); this link is our own observation. The couplet can be read in two ways: the rival's attack on the lover is an unavoidable stroke of fate, or the lover, his sight darkened at that moment, could not see the rival coming.

In the third couplet the idiom "rāstına getürmek" describes an affair going well. The word "rāst" in its dictionary sense means both "straight, upright" and "fitting"; in divan poetry the cypress is the symbol of a straight, upright stature. Thus a congruence of images (tenasüp) arises between the word and the cypress; this observation is our own. In the fourth couplet the morning breeze is brought to life as a companion who hurries at dawn to stroll with the beloved's tresses. The lover's wish to reach the beloved in the third couplet and the breeze's reaching the tresses in the fourth stand side by side: what the lover hopes to attain one day, the breeze attains every dawn. This reading is our own inference.

In the pen-name couplet Münîr gives himself advice. The Arabic phrase "meżā mā meżā" in its dictionary sense means "what is past is past", and it closes the couplet like a proverb. Münîrî's habit of using proverbs and set phrases in his poems can be seen in this ghazal as well.

Bibliography

Online sources