Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün

Ey felek ben tek giriftâr-ı belâ gördün mü hîç
Derd-keş-i mihnet-zede bir mübtelâ gördün mi hîç
Var mı gam-hâne-i ‘âlemde âyâ ben gibi
Mübtelâ gayr ez Hüseyn-i Kerbelâ gördün mi hîç
Var seyrin bunca kim ‘âlemde devrân eyledin
Kec gidiş kendin gibi bir bî-vefâ gördün mi hîç
Ey gönül gamlar çeküp hâlin perîşân itme kim
Bî-elem bir şâhı yâ în bir gedâ gördün mi hîç
Öyle sanam yokdur ammâ var ise bir söyle kim
Bir güli bî-hâr u bâli bî-belâ gördün mi hîç
Ey dil-i şûrîde-i şehr-i cünûn kendin gibi
Kişver-i ‘âlemde rüsvây-ı hevâ gördün mi hîç
Dil tek ey Seyyid Nigârî bunca kim ‘âlemde sen
Dem-be-dem yildin yügürdün bir belâ gördün mi hîç

In English

1. O sphere, have you ever seen one afflicted like me; have you ever seen a sufferer of pain, stricken with hardship, so smitten?

2. Is there anyone like me in the house of grief that is the world; apart from Husayn of Karbala, have you ever seen one so afflicted?

3. You have wandered and turned so much in the world; have you ever seen anyone crooked in his course and faithless like yourself?

4. O heart, do not suffer grief and scatter your state; have you ever seen a king or a beggar without sorrow?

5. I do not think so, there is none; but if there is, tell me: have you ever seen a rose without a thorn, a heart without trouble?

6. O love-mad heart of the city of madness, have you ever seen anyone in the land of the world disgraced by desire like yourself?

7. O Seyyid Nigârî, you have run and walked every moment in the world like the heart; have you ever seen so great a calamity? (The couplet has been understood approximately.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

The refrain "gördün mü hîç", have you ever seen, turns the ghazal into an interrogation, and the questions are first directed at the sphere. The sphere in divan poetry is the sky that turns man's fortune and is usually hostile to the lover. The second couplet sets the measure of the question: apart from Husayn of Karbala, is there anyone as afflicted as the lover? Husayn's suffering is named here as the greatest example of calamity; the lover can compare his own pain only to his. In the third couplet the question turns on the sphere itself: have you seen anyone crooked in his course and faithless like yourself?

In the fourth and fifth couplets the tone of the questions changes and becomes consolation. The heart should not suffer grief and scatter its state, for there is neither king nor beggar without sorrow. There is no rose without a thorn, no heart without trouble. The lover's complaint is thus tied to a universal rule: pain is the condition of being human. In the sixth couplet the question turns again to the heart; the heart is a dweller of "şehr-i cünûn", the city of madness, and has been disgraced for the sake of "hevâ", desire.

The rhyme of the ghazal rests on a long "â" (belâ, mübtelâ, Kerbelâ, bî-vefâ, gedâ, hevâ), yet the ghazal stands in the cim section. The reason is the last word of the refrain: "hîç" ends in the Persian letter "çim". Since in the Ottoman alphabetical order the letters peculiar to Persian (pe, çim, je, gâf) were counted with the nearest Arabic letter, ghazals ending in the letter çim were placed in the cim section; the ghazals with the refrain "görgeç" in this part of the divan are here for the same reason.

Bibliography

Online sources