Original Persian Text

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

Ey dil ez-ḥādis̱e-i hicr melūlīm melūl
Ki be-vaṣleş ne-buved ḥācet-i men hīc ḳabūl
Yā Rab ez-ṭāli‘ u baḫtem meded āyed ki buved
Ber-şeb-i tīre-i hicr-i to seḥer-gāh-ı vüṣūl
Ger dem-i ‘ömr buved sāl-i hezār er nefesī
Yek buved dergeh-i vaṣl-ı to ki āyed be-vüṣūl
Hīc ber-ḳālib-i fersūde ġam-ı rūḥ ne-mānd
Tā ḫayāl-i leb-i la‘let ki be-dil kerd ḥulūl
Bār-ı ‘ışḳ-ı to ki ber-gerden-i ḫod dāşt Münīr
Hīc ne’bved ‘aceb ey dost ẓalūmest cehūl

In English

1. O heart, we are weary, utterly weary of the calamity of separation; for none of our prayers to be united with him is accepted.

2. O Lord, if only help would come from my fortune and my luck, and after the dark night of separation from you the dawn of union would rise.

3. Even if each breath of life were a thousand years, that thousand years would equal a single moment of arriving at the threshold of union with you. (The couplet is hard to understand; here Ersoy's reading, "Even if one breath in our life were a thousand years, it would equal one moment of union with you", has been followed.)

4. Since the image of your ruby lip entered the heart, no grief of the spirit has remained in the worn-out body. ("Ḥulūl", in its dictionary sense, means one thing entering into another and settling there.)

5. O friend, Münîr has taken the burden of your love upon his own neck; no wonder that he is most unjust, most ignorant. (The line recalls the epithets "zalûm" and "cehûl" said of man in the verse of the Trust in the Qur'an. Ersoy understands the line as "Is it any wonder that the ignorant is unjust?")

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 ninety-seventh of the Persian ghazals (fg 97). The metre is "fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilün". The ghazal has no refrain (redif) and does not appear in Ersoy's list of refrains. The rhyme is the sound "-ūl": melūl, ḳabūl, vüṣūl, ḥulūl, cehūl. In the third couplet the word "vüṣūl" is used a second time in the rhyme. 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 85a). To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The ghazal opens with the weariness of separation. In the opening couplet the repetition "melūlīm melūl" carries the depth of the weariness into the very wording; the prayers and wishes not being accepted prepare the couplet for the supplication of the second. In the second couplet separation is likened to a dark night and union to the dawn that will come after it. The words fortune and luck belong to the language of the stars and the sky; the contrast between night and dawn completes the same celestial picture.

The third couplet sets up a comparison about time. Even if each breath of life were to stretch to a thousand years, all that span would only equal a single moment of union. The contrast between breath and a thousand years, between a moment and a lifetime, magnifies beyond measure the worth of the moment of union. The syntax of the couplet is obscure and open to other readings as well.

In the fourth couplet the image of the beloved's ruby lip has entered the heart and erased every grief of the spirit in the body. In divan poetry the beloved's lip is thought of as a source that grants life; even its image settles in the worn-out body like a spirit. The word "ḥulūl" is a term for one thing entering into another and settling in it, and it tells of the image's entering the heart with this weighty word. There is also a contrast between "ḳālib" (body, mould) and "rūḥ" (spirit).

The pen-name couplet (mahlas) carries a plain allusion (telmih) to the Qur'an. Verse 72 of the sura al-Ahzab tells how the Trust was offered to the heavens, the earth and the mountains, how they shrank from bearing it, and how man bore it, and it uses for man the epithets "zalûm" (most unjust) and "cehûl" (most ignorant). Münîrî places these two words in the rhyme: Münîr, who has taken the burden of love upon his neck, is like man who bore that heavy Trust. Ersoy gives the meaning of the couplet without touching on the verse. At the end of the ghazal the congruence of images (tenasüp) between "bār" (burden) and "gerden" (neck) ties the weight of love's burden to a concrete image.

Bibliography

Online sources