Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilâtün fâilün

Bu fenâ ‘âlemde âyâ bilmedim bilmem ne var
Cân virüp ‘arzuya dâ’im bilmedim bilmem ne var

In English

1. In this transient world, I wonder what there is; I never knew, I do not know. In giving one's life and always (running after) desire, what is there; I never knew, I do not know.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is recorded in the cönk as a ghazal (gazel). The ghazal is the aruz verse form whose opening couplet (matla) rhymes within itself and whose other couplets are tied to that rhyme; folk poets also used this form. Because Hakverdioğlu's article publishes only the first verse unit of each poem in the cönk, we know only the opening couplet of this poem. The refrain is "bilmedim bilmem ne var"; the rhyme in "âyâ / dâ'im" is weak. The identification of the metre is ours; as is usual in the aruz poems of folk poets, some syllables may not fit the pattern exactly. To whom and on what occasion the poem was composed is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet expresses bewilderment before the meaning of worldly life. The "fenâ âlemi", the world that passes away, is in Sufi poetry the opposite of the "bekâ âlemi", the lasting world. The poet says he does not know what is to be found in this world, nor understand what good it does to spend one's life for the sake of desires. The repeated refrain "bilmedim bilmem ne var" (I never knew, I do not know what there is) joins past and present tense to show that this ignorance has never changed. The expression can be read as a continuation of the confession of "not knowing" found in folk Sufi poetry since Yunus Emre.

Historical Context

The poem is recorded under the pen name "Nazîf" in the Merzifon Cönkü introduced by Metin Hakverdioğlu in 2019. The cönk contains ten of Nazîf's poems, one in syllabic metre and nine in aruz; the aruz poems are all ghazals, and most carry religious and moral admonition. The article gives no information about the poet; the poet's identity and the century in which he lived have not been determined. Since the cönk is thought to have been compiled in Merzifon within the literary circle of Eyüb Sabrî, the poet may have been one read or living in that circle. For details, see the page on Nazîf. The poem is on page 68 of the cönk and page 550 of the article; its full text is in the cönk itself and has not been published to date.

Bibliography

Online sources