Original Persian Text

Metre: fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün

Vaṣf-ı la‘let-rā çi mī-gūyem ki ez-cān ḫoşterest
Her dem ez-yādeş meẕāḳ-ı cān-ı men pür-şekkerest
Bā-ḫayāl-i la‘l-i to engüşterī-bāzed meger
Ber-dehān-ı ġonca-i lāle ez-ān ḫākisterest
Ez-hevā-yı gül-şen ü ruḫsār u bāġ-ı ‘ārıżet
Çehre-i zerd-i men-i dil-ḫaste çün nīlūferest
Zāhid-i kem-ḫᵛāre-rā ger şod hevā-yı bāġ-ı ḫuld
‘Āşıḳān-ı lāübālī-rā ḫayāl-i dīgerest
Ez-fürūġ-ı şem‘-i ruḫsāret ki mī-sūzed Münīr
Her dem ez-sūz-ı derūneş sīne gūyā micmerest

In English

1. What shall I say in praise of your ruby-red lip; it is sweeter than life itself. From remembering it at every moment the palate of my soul is filled with sugar. ("La‘l", in its dictionary sense, is a precious red stone; in divan poetry it stands for the beloved's lip.)

2. The tulip bud must have played the ring game with the image of your ruby lip; that is why there is ash in its mouth. ("Engüşterī-bāzī", in its dictionary sense, is the ring game. Ersoy explains the words "there is ash in its mouth" as "it has been deceived". The black spot in the middle of the tulip is imagined as ash.)

3. From my longing for the rose garden and orchard of your cheek, the yellowed face of me, the heartsick lover, is like the water lily.

4. If the longing for the garden of paradise has come into the mind of the ascetic who eats and drinks little, the carefree lovers have another dream. ("Bāġ-ı ḫuld", in its dictionary sense, is the garden of eternity, that is, paradise; "lāübālī" means carefree, heeding nothing.)

5. Münîr burns from the light of the candle of your cheek; from the burning within, his breast is at every moment like a censer. ("Micmer", in its dictionary sense, is the vessel in which aloeswood, incense and other fragrant things are burned.)

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 fortieth of the Persian ghazals (fg 40). The metre is "fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilün". In his list of refrains Ersoy places this ghazal among those with the refrain (redif) "est". The rhyme is the sound "-er": ḫoşter, şekker, ḫākister, nīlūfer, dīger, micmer. The poem is found in the Vatican (VT 71a) and Vienna (VY 54b) manuscripts. No manuscript variants are recorded for this ghazal in Ersoy's apparatus. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The first two couplets of the ghazal are about the beloved's lip. In the opening couplet the lip is sweeter than life, and merely recalling it fills the mouth with sugar; the words sweet, sugar and palate form a congruence of images (tenasüp). The second couplet is the most skilful place in the ghazal. The tulip bud has entered into the ring game with the beloved's ruby lip and lost; ash is left in its mouth. To present the dark spot at the bottom of the tulip's cup as ash is to find a poetic cause for an appearance in nature, and in this respect it is an example of the figure of fanciful aetiology (hüsn-i talil). According to Ersoy's explanation, ash remaining in the mouth expresses having been deceived. Since the ring game rests on finding in whose hand an object is hidden, the tulip is shown as the side that fails to find what is sought and loses. The likeness between the red of the tulip and the red of the lip makes the two rivals in the same game.

In the third couplet the colour is now yellow. The lover's face has yellowed like the water lily from longing for the garden of the beloved's cheek. The words rose garden, orchard and water lily, together with the tulip, form a congruence of flower and garden images in the ghazal. The fourth couplet compares the ascetic and the lover. The ascetic who eats and drinks little dreams of the garden of paradise, while the dream of the carefree lovers is another; what this "other dream" is goes unsaid, but within the flow of the ghazal it is understood to be the garden of the beloved's cheek. The comparison of the garden of paradise with the garden of the cheek is a familiar form in divan poetry of the lover's preferring present beauty to the ascetic's distant promise.

In the pen-name couplet (mahlas) the image of fire comes to the fore. The beloved's cheek is a candle; Münîr burns in its light, and his breast smokes like a censer from the burning within. The words candle, burning, fire and censer form a congruence of images among themselves. That a censer gives off a fragrant scent as it burns suggests that the lover's pain, too, turns into something beautiful, perhaps poetry; but the couplet does not say this openly. The rhymes "ḫākister" (ash) in the second couplet and "micmer" (censer) in the last place two traces of burning facing each other at the beginning and end of the ghazal.

Bibliography

Online sources