Münîrî, Persian Tuyugh 10: Affliction, the Heart's Friend

Persian Tuyugh 10 — Tā-ki şod derd-i ġamet ġam-ḫᵛār-ı dil

Amasya05 Editorial Board • Editor: Mevlüt Erdem Öztürk • 01 October 2026 • Updated: 07 October 2026 • 3 min reading

In Münîrî's second Persian tuyugh, pain becomes the heart's companion and affliction the soul's friend, and the lover weeps because he is far from the wound of the glance.

Original Persian Text

Metre: fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün

Tā-ki şod derd-i ġamet ġam-ḫᵛār-ı dil
Mūnis-i cān şod belā vü yār-ı dil
Dūrem ez-zaḫm-ı ḫadeng-i ġamzeet
Nālehā-yı zār ez-ān şod kār-ı dil

In English

1. Ever since the pain of your grief became the heart's companion in sorrow, affliction has become the soul's intimate and the heart's friend. Because I am far from the wound of the arrow of your glance, the heart's work has become moaning and weeping. (The first two lines can be understood in two ways; see the commentary.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a four-line tuyugh written in Persian; in the edition it is the tenth of the tuyughs and the second of Münîrî's two Persian tuyughs (tyğ 10). The metre is "fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün". The redif is "dil" (heart) and the rhyme is the sound "-ār": ġam-ḫᵛār, yār, kār; the third line ("ġamzeet") is unrhymed. The quatrain is found in all three manuscripts (VT 178a, VY 149a, Ü 62a). The meaning given in English rests on the original text and on Ersoy's Turkish rendering in the apparatus. It is not known for whom or when it was written.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The first two lines can be understood in two ways. The Kubbealtı gives "gamhar" the sense of one who suffers grief, who is sorrowful. Ersoy understands the first line as "ever since the heart began to suffer anxiety with the pain of your love", and the second as affliction and "the heart's beloved" together becoming the friends of the soul. According to the text, however, the pain itself has become the companion who shares the heart's sorrow, and affliction has become both the soul's intimate and the heart's friend; we have followed this reading in the translation. In both readings the lover embraces suffering as a friend.

In the last two lines there is a familiar paradox of love. The Kubbealtı explains "hadeng" as arrow. The lover longs to be wounded by the arrow of the beloved's glance; to be far from this wound is his real pain, and for this reason the heart moans and weeps. Ersoy's rendering says "because I am parted from the arrows of your sidelong glance"; the text also contains the word "zaḫm", wound. With the rhymes "ġam-ḫᵛār", "yār" and "kār" the heart's companion, friend and work are named in turn.