Original Persian Text

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

Çi ḫoşterest ki tīġ-i to ber-derūn reften
Ne-būd ber-dil-i evger ser-i birūn reften?
Şenīdeem ki dil ez-men be-eşk-i dīde be-reft
Zi-dāġ-ı ‘ışḳ-ı to be’nmūd lāle-gūn reften
Dilem ki behr-i ḫam-ı zülfet ez-cihān be-güẕeşt
Be-rāh-ı ‘ışḳ-ı to īnest ber-cünūn reften
Zi-dest-i ḫancer-i ān ġamze būd rīş-i dilem
‘Aceb ne-mī-şeved ez-dīde seyl-i ḫūn reften
Teraḳḳī-i ġam-ı ‘ışḳet ki ber-Münīr-i to şod
Hemīn buved be-cihān merd-rā füzūn reften

In English

1. How pleasant it is for your sword to go into the heart. The meaning of the second line is uncertain: taken word by word in their dictionary senses, it can be read as a question, "Did the heart have no wish to go out?"; the word "evger" has not been resolved, and Ersoy does not give the meaning of this line either.

2. I heard that my heart went from me along with my tears; from the wound of your love it went the colour of a tulip, steeped in blood.

3. My heart, which gave up the world for the curl of your tresses: this is what it means to go into madness on the path of your love.

4. The wound of my heart was opened by the hand of that sidelong glance's dagger; no wonder a flood of blood runs from the eye.

5. The grief of your love grew and grew in your Münîr; in this world, too, to advance and go on increasing is what befits a man.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet ghazal (gazel) written in Persian; in the edition it is the hundred and thirty-first of the Persian ghazals (fg 131). The metre is "mefâ‘ilün fe‘ilâtün mefâ‘ilün fe‘ilün". The refrain (redif) is the infinitive "reften" (to go); in Ersoy's list of refrains this ghazal is also given with the refrain "reften". The rhyme is the sound "-ūn": derūn, birūn, lāle-gūn, cünūn, ḫūn, füzūn. Ersoy counts this ghazal among his examples of kafiye-i müreddefe (rhyme with a long vowel before the rhyme letter). The poem is found only in the Vatican manuscript (VT 93a). To whom and when it was written is not known.

In the edition the second line of the opening couplet (matla) ends with a question mark. By Ersoy's rule a "?" at the end of a couplet marks a couplet he could not interpret; but the line may also have been built as a question. In his apparatus Ersoy gives the meaning of the first line only and says nothing about the second. The rendering above is therefore an attempt based on the dictionary senses of the words and should not be taken as certain.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

Every couplet of the ghazal turns on the verb "to go". The sword goes into the heart, the heart leaves the lover and goes off with the tears, one goes into madness on the path of love, a flood of blood goes running from the eye, and in the end the lover's grief goes on increasing. That the same infinitive describes a different movement in each couplet shows that the refrain carries the subject of the poem. In the opening couplet "derūn" (inside) and "birūn" (outside) meet in the rhyme position; this contrast also supports the opposition between the sword's going in and the heart's going out. This link is our own observation.

In the second couplet the heart goes off mingled with the tears and takes on the colour of the tulip from the wound of love. The word "dāġ", in its dictionary sense, means a brand mark or burn scar; its pairing with the tulip fits the divan image that likens the dark spot at the centre of the red flower to the lover's wound. The link between tresses and madness in the third couplet is also a familiar one: the curl of the tresses is thought of as a chain, and madness calls to mind being put in chains. The heart has given up the world and bound itself to the curl of the tresses, and the poet calls this going into "cünūn" (madness) on the path of love.

The fourth couplet joins the sidelong glance (gamze) to the dagger. The beloved's glance is a dagger, the wound it opens is in the heart, and the blood that flows is in the eye. This path between heart and eye rests on the divan idea that tears are blood torn from the heart. In the pen-name couplet (mahlas) there is a closeness of meaning between "teraḳḳī" (progress) and "füzūn reften" (to go on increasing). Ersoy understands the couplet to mean that, just as a man must advance in the world, Münîr too has made progress in the matter of love; our rendering also rests on this reading. Counting the growth of grief as progress reflects a view of love as a path and a series of stations.

Bibliography

Online sources