Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ûlü Mefâ‘îlü Mefâ‘îlü Fe‘ûlün

Merdânedir ol ki çeke peymâne-i Ahmed
Ferzânedir ol ki ola mestâne-i Ahmed
Ferhâd ü Mecnûn heme erbâb-ı cünûna
Sultanlık ider ‘âşık-ı dîvâne-i Ahmed
Tâvus-ı behiştdir yeridir huld-i muhalled
Her kim ola pervâne-i sûzâne-i Ahmed
İkbâli yegidir kim ola kâle-i meh-veş
İkbâl-i bed oldur ola bîgâne-i Ahmed
Nesh oldu kamu nakl-i hikâyât-ı lezîze
Bozdı revişin lezzet-i efsâne-i Ahmed
Ben bilmezem evsâfını Mevlâ bilür ammâ
Hûrşîde virür şa‘şa‘a gülhâne-i Ahmed
Ferdâ ‘arasât içre Nigârî ne gam eyler
Kim olsa bugün sûzıla pervâne-i Ahmed

In English

1. He is a true man who drinks the goblet of Ahmed; he is wise who is drunk with Ahmed.

2. The mad lover of Ahmed rules as sultan over all the people of madness, Farhad and Majnun among them.

3. Whoever becomes Ahmed's burning moth is a peacock of paradise; his place is the eternal garden.

4. Better is the fortune of one who becomes the "kâle" of the moon-faced one; ill fortune is to be a stranger to Ahmed. (What "kâle" means here is not clear.)

5. The telling of all delightful tales has been abrogated; the delight of Ahmed's story has spoiled their course.

6. I do not know his qualities, but the Lord knows; the rose garden of Ahmed gives the sun its radiance.

7. What grief shall Nigârî suffer tomorrow on the plain of resurrection, who today burns as a moth of Ahmed?

Literary and Historical Commentary

"Nesh" in the fifth couplet is a term of Islamic law and exegesis. Nesh is the cancelling of an earlier ruling by one that comes later; that Islam abrogated the laws of the earlier religions is also expressed with this term. Nigârî carries the term over to stories: the delight of the Prophet's story has abrogated all other delightful stories and spoiled their course. As the new law cancelled the old laws, so the Prophet's tale has taken the place of the other tales that were told.

The ghazal follows the previous praise poem in the same metre, and this time the refrain holds the Prophet's other name, "Ahmed". Written in Arabic letters as "احمد", this name too ends in dâl. In the rhyme the words of the tavern (peymâne, mestâne, dîvâne) stand beside words of story and garden (efsâne, gülhâne). In the first two couplets the language of the tavern and of madness is applied to love for the Prophet. He who drinks Ahmed's cup is a true man, he who is drunk with him is wise; setting "ferzâne", wise, beside "mestâne", drunk, in the rhyme is a paradox, for this drunkenness is reason itself. Ahmed's mad lover rules even over Farhad and Majnun.

The moth returns in the third couplet and again in the last. The moth burning in Ahmed's candle becomes a peacock of paradise; the peacock is the bird counted the ornament of the gardens of paradise. At the close this burning is turned into an assurance: the poet who burns today as Ahmed's moth will suffer no grief tomorrow on the "arasât", the plain where people will gather to be called to account. In the sixth couplet the poet says he cannot know the Prophet's qualities; only the Lord knows them.

Bibliography

Online sources