Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilün

Dolanam başına ey sâkî-i ser-şâr kadeh
Pây-mâl eyledi gam lutf eyle tekrâr kadeh
Mest-i lâ-ya‘kıl peymâne-i çeşmin ister
Nigehi cilve-i sermest ü ser-şâr kadeh
Çeşm-i humârına benzer diyü ey mâye-i cân
Kılmış ol ‘âşık-ı şeydâları mey-hâr kadeh
Eyledin kim bizi bî-‘akl u ser-â-sîme didim
Ne olur meskenimiz söyledi kuh-sâr kadeh
Ne kadar var felek gerdiş-i devrân itsin
Degmesün dest-i elem görmesün âzâr kadeh
Ne revâdur gele meyhâneye erbâb-ı vera‘
Ne münâsib ola agyâr sezâvâr-ı kadeh
Ne bilür câm nedür bâde-i gül-fâm nedür
Olmayan bâde-peres bilmeyen esrâr-ı kadeh
Dâhil-i zümre-i lâ-havfün ‘aleyhimden olur
Lâübâlî dolanur haşr fedâkâr kadeh
Koyma elden yere ey Mîr Nigârî nûş it
Ne kadar var dü ‘âlem ne kadar var kadeh

In English

1. O cupbearer of the brimming cup, let me circle round your head (let me be your sacrifice); grief has trampled me underfoot, be kind, pour the cup again.

2. The drunk who has lost his senses wants the goblet of your eye; its glance, the coquetry of one drunk beyond himself, is a brimming cup.

3. O leaven of the soul, saying "it is like your languid, wine-heavy eye", the cup has turned those frenzied lovers into drinkers of wine.

4. "You have made us witless and bewildered," I said; "What will be our dwelling?" The cup said: "the mountains." (The couplet has been understood approximately; falling to the mountains like Majnun and Farhad may be meant.)

5. However long the sphere keeps up the turning of time, may the hand of sorrow not touch the cup, may the cup suffer no harm.

6. It is not right for the people of piety to come to the tavern, nor fitting for strangers to be worthy of the cup.

7. What does he know of what the goblet is, of what rose-coloured wine is, who does not worship wine and does not know the secrets of the cup?

8. The cup enters the company of whom it is said "no fear shall be upon them"; at the resurrection it will go about self-sacrificing and carefree. (The couplet has been understood approximately.)

9. O Mîr Nigârî, do not set it down from your hand, drink; as long as the two worlds last, so long will the cup last.

Literary and Historical Commentary

In the eighth couplet the cup is admitted to the company named by the words "lâ havfün aleyhim", no fear shall be upon them, from verse 62 of the sura Yunus. The full verse speaks of God's friends: "Surely the friends of God, no fear shall be upon them, nor shall they grieve." Nigârî ties these words to the wine cup and imagines it moving carelessly about the field of resurrection like a saint. The edition leaves the couplet unglossed and the details are guesswork, but the drift is plain: the cup the zealot counts a sin stands in the poet's world among the ranks of the saints. That is why the "erbâb-ı vera‘", the people of piety, of the sixth couplet have no place in the tavern.

The cup stands at the end of every couplet and turns into a speaker. In the fourth couplet the lover complains to it: "You have made us witless and bewildered, what will be our dwelling?" The cup answers in a single word: "kûhsâr", the mountains. The place of a lover who has lost his mind is Majnun's desert or Farhad's mountain; the cup tells the lover his future. In the fifth couplet the poet prays for the cup instead: as long as the sphere turns, may the hand of sorrow not touch it, may it not break. In divan poetry the sphere is itself likened to an upturned bowl; here the turning sky and the offered cup stand side by side.

What puts the ghazal in the hâ section is the last letter of its refrain: in Arabic script "kadeh" ends in "hâ" (ح). Before the refrain the words ser-şâr, tekrâr, mey-hâr, kûh-sâr, âzâr, sezâvâr, esrâr and fedâkâr rhyme. "Dolanam başına" in the first couplet is the expression "let me circle round your head", let me be your sacrifice, still used in Azerbaijani and Anatolian speech, and it opens the plea to the cupbearer with the warmth of everyday language.

Bibliography

Online sources