Original Persian Text

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

Ey dīden-i cemāl-i to-rā ḥüsn-i ṭāli‘est
Baḫt-ı siyeh be-dīdeneş ey dost māni‘est
Ḫāl-i siyeh ki ber-ḫaṭ-ı jengāriyet fütād
Mefhūm-ı noḳṭa-i ḳalem-i ṣun‘-ı Ṣāni‘est
Her ḫaṭṭ-ı dil-küşā ki şod ū ber-beyāż-ı levḥ
Mecmū‘a-i cemāl-i to fī’l-cümle cāmi‘est
Āyā buved ki būse resed z’ān leb-şeker
Düşnām-ı telḫ-rā zi-to ān-kes ki ḳāni‘est
Cüz der-hevā-yı silsile-i zülf-i pür-ḫamet
‘Ömrī ki bu’gẕered be-cihān ‘ömr-i żāyi‘est
Pür-nūr u fer şeved çü dil ü dīde-i Münīr
Her cā ki pertev-i meh-i rūy-ı to lāmi‘est

In English

1. O beloved, the sight of whose beauty is the finest of fortunes, O friend, my black fortune keeps me from seeing it. ("Ḥüsn-i ṭāli‘", in its dictionary sense, means good fortune, a happy lot; the good fortune of the first line stands against the black fortune of the second.)

2. The black mole that has fallen upon your verdigris-green down is the meaning of the dot of the Creator's pen of creation. ("Ḫaṭ" means both "writing" and the down on the cheek. "Jengārī", in its dictionary sense, means "the colour of verdigris, greenish"; the first down on a young face is described with this colour. The mole is likened to the dot a pen leaves on paper.)

3. Every heart-gladdening line that appears on the white of the tablet, that is, every hair of down on the white of the face, is the anthology of your beauty; in short, it gathers your beauty wholly in itself. ("Beyāż" means both "whiteness" and "notebook, draft book", and "mecmū‘a" both "a collection of poems and writings" and "a gathered whole". "Fī’l-cümle" is an Arabic phrase meaning "in short, entirely".)

4. Will a kiss ever reach from that sugar lip the one who is content with the bitter abuse that comes from you? ("Düşnām" means abuse, harsh words. The lover counts enduring the beloved's bitter words as the price of reaching the sweet lip.)

5. A life spent in the world apart from passion for the chain of your curling locks is a wasted life. ("Silsile" means both "chain" and "a series of linked rings"; the curling lock is likened to a chain.)

6. Wherever the light of the moon of your face shines, Münîr's heart and eyes fill there with light and radiance. (Ersoy explains the couplet as: because every place is lit by the moonlight of the beloved's face, Münîr's heart is filled with light and his eyes with radiance.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a six-couplet ghazal (gazel) written in Persian; in the edition it is the thirteenth of the Persian ghazals (fg 13). The metre is "mef‘ûlü fâ‘ilâtü mefâ‘îlü fâ‘ilün". In Ersoy's list of refrains the ghazal appears among those with the refrain (redif) "est". The rhyme is made with words of Arabic origin built on the same pattern: ṭāli‘, māni‘, Ṣāni‘, cāmi‘, ḳāni‘, żāyi‘, lāmi‘. All these words are nouns formed on the Arabic "fâ‘il" pattern and mean, in order, fortune, hindering, creator, gathering, contented, lost and shining; this arrangement gives the ghazal a grave and learned sound. The poem is found in the Vatican (VT 64b) and Vienna (VY 48a) manuscripts. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The most prominent feature of the ghazal is the congruence of images (tenasüp) drawn from writing and books in the second and third couplets. The down on the beloved's cheek is seen as "ḫaṭ", writing; the white of the face is the tablet or notebook on which the writing is written; and the mole on the cheek is the dot left by the pen. This dot is the dot of the Creator's pen of creation; the beloved's beauty is thus counted as the work of a divine script. In the third couplet the same face is likened to a "mecmua", an anthology in which all the parts of beauty are gathered. The words "ḫaṭ", "beyāż", "levḥ", "mecmū‘a" and "ḳalem" come from the world of writing and books. According to the TDV article, Münîrî says in Mihr ü Müşterî that he wrote in all the styles of calligraphy; the sources, however, draw no link between this ghazal and the poet's calligraphy.

The other couplets concern the lover's fortune and patience. In the first couplet there is a contrast (tezat) between "ḥüsn-i ṭāli‘", good fortune, and "baḫt-ı siyeh", black fortune: seeing the beloved is the greatest fortune, but the lover's black fortune stands in the way. In the fourth couplet the contrast between bitter words and the sugar lip makes the lover's contentment look like a bargain. The fifth couplet counts a life spent without being bound to the chain of the locks as a life wasted. In the second couplet "Ṣāni‘", the Creator, and "ṣun‘", creation, come from the same root and form a pun based on shared derivation (iştikak). In the third couplet the phrase "fī’l-cümle", "entirely", and the rhyme word "cāmi‘", "gathering", express the idea of wholeness twice. The pen-name couplet (mahlas) closes the ghazal with the image of light; wherever the moonlight of the face falls, the lover's heart and eyes are lit up.

Bibliography

Online sources