Original Persian Text

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

Ey ruḫet gül-berg-i sürḫ ü ‘ārıżet şod ber-sefīd
Çeşm-i bed bādā be-devr-i ḥüsnet ey dil-ber sefīd
Key buved mānend-i ḫāl ü ‘ārıż-ı meh-tāb-ı to
Gerçi mī-bāşed siyāh-ı dīde ḫūb ender-sefīd
İḳtibās-ı şemse-i ḫūr z’āftāb-ı ḥüsn-i tost
Z’ān buved ber-ṭāḳ-ı çarḫ ey māh-ı sīmīn-ber sefīd
Baḫt-ı men çün zülf-i şeb-renget siyāh üftādeest
Key buved çün ṣubḥ-ı ṣādıḳ yā Rab ū dīger sefīd
Yek cevān-ı ġonca-leb-rā ‘āşıḳ-ı şeydā şodem
Ḥāl çün bāşed ki pīr-i nā-tüvānem ser-sefīd
Pertev-i ‘aks-i cemāl-i yār bīnā kerd bāz
Gerçi mī-şod dīde-i giryān-ı men ber der-sefīd
Z’intiẓār-ı ṭal‘at-ı ruḫsār-ı ān meh-rū Münīr
Çeşm-i mā şod çün vücūd-ı dīde-i aḫter sefīd

In English

1. O you whose face is a red rose petal, whose cheek blooms upon white; O heart-stealer, in the age of your beauty may the evil eye turn white, that is, go blind. ("Çeşm sefīd şoden", in its dictionary sense, is the whitening of the eye, its going blind; the line is like a curse upon the evil eye.)

2. It is true that black looks fine upon the white of the eye; but can this be the likeness of the mole upon your moonlit cheek.

3. The disc of the sun has taken its light from the sun of your beauty; that is why, O silver-bodied moon, there is whiteness on the arch of the heavens. ("İḳtibās", in its dictionary sense, is taking light, taking a share of something; "ṭāḳ-ı çarḫ" is the arch of the sky, the vault of heaven.)

4. My fortune has fallen black like your night-coloured tresses; O Lord, when will it too turn white like the true dawn. ("Ṣubḥ-ı ṣādıḳ", in its dictionary sense, is the true dawn, the time when the horizon fully whitens; the passing brightness before it is called the "false dawn". Black fortune means ill luck.)

5. I have become madly in love with a youth with rosebud lips; how shall it go with me, a feeble old man with a white head. (Ersoy understands the second line as "my state has become that of a feeble old man whose hair has turned white"; the line can also be read as saying that the lover is already old.)

6. My weeping eye was turning wholly white and going blind; but the light of the reflection of the beloved's beauty made it a seeing eye again.

7. O Münîr, from waiting for the rising of that moon-faced one's cheek, our eye has turned white like the eye of the stars. (Ersoy explains it as "we have gone blind"; the stars' watching all night without sleep and their white shining are the ground of this comparison.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a seven-couplet ghazal (gazel) written in Persian; in the edition it is the forty-sixth of the Persian ghazals (fg 46). The metre is "fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilâtün fâ‘ilün". The refrain (redif) is the word "sefīd" (white); in Ersoy's list of refrains this ghazal stands alone with the refrain "sefīd". The rhyme is the sound "-er": ber, dil-ber, ender, sīmīn-ber, dīger, ser, der, aḫter. The poem is found in the Vatican (VT 72a) and Vienna (VY 57b) manuscripts. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole ghazal is built on the contrast of white and black, and the refrain "sefīd" is tied to a different meaning in each couplet. In the opening couplet white is both the colour of the beloved's skin and the whitening and blinding of the evil eye. In the second couplet the black pupil upon the white of the eye is compared with the black mole on the beloved's white cheek. In the third couplet whiteness is the brightness of the vault of heaven; the sun has borrowed its light from the beloved. In the fourth couplet whitening is the coming of dawn, in the fifth the white hair of an old man, and in the sixth and seventh once again the whitening of the eye. The use of a single colour in so many places and senses turns the ghazal into a play of colour; the words black tresses, black fortune, black mole and night also form a series of contrasts against the refrain.

In the opening couplet the red rose petal and the white skin paint a picture in colour, and right after comes a curse upon the evil eye. This saying, uttered to protect beauty from the evil eye, is in divan poetry a way of praising the beloved. In the third couplet the claim that the sun takes its light from the beloved's beauty is a hyperbole that holds the beloved above the sun; the words sun, moon, sphere and silver form a congruence of images (tenasüp) through their connection with the sky and brightness. In the fourth couplet a comparison is made between black fortune and the black of the tresses; the lover wishes that his fortune too might whiten like the dawn. The phrase "ṣubḥ-ı ṣādıḳ" distinguishes the true brightness of morning from the false dawn and hints that the lover wants a lasting happiness.

The fifth couplet carries a voice of age and old age rarely heard in the ghazal. The lover has fallen for a youth with rosebud lips, but he himself is feeble and white-haired. The contrast between youth and old age, rosebud and white hair, lends the couplet a sadness. In the sixth couplet the eye that was close to going blind from weeping sees again by the light of the beloved's beauty. The whitening of the eye from tears and its seeing again through a sign from the beloved recalls the story told in the Qur'an of the prophet Jacob, whose eyes turned white from weeping for Joseph; but the couplet does not name this story. In the pen-name couplet (mahlas) the length of the waiting is measured by the stars: the eye that waits for the rising of the beloved's face has turned white like the eye of the stars that stay open all night.

Bibliography

Online sources