Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilâtün Fâ‘ilün

Dâd kılam ey sanem tâ çend çend
Çend çend yanam yakılam bend bend
Bend bend a‘zâlarım tutmuş hevâ
Ney gibi feryâd kılam derd-mend
Derd-mend-i la‘linem kim subh u şâm
İsterem şehdâb-ı la‘lin şevk-mend
Şevk-mend-i la‘linem kim dem-be-dem
Tûtî-i tab‘em saçar şehdâb u kand
Kand-ı la‘linden gönül ister devâ
Başka dermân istemez ol müstemend
Müstemend-i kâkülün tutmuş hevâ
Kayda çek ey zülf-i Leylâ bend bend
Bende düşdün ey Nigârî çekme gam
Hall eyler bendi Şâh Nakşibend

In English

1. O idol (beauty), how long, how long shall I cry out; how long shall I burn and be burned joint by joint?

2. Desire (for love) has seized all my limbs joint by joint; let me, sick at heart, cry out like the reed flute.

3. I am one sick for your ruby lip; morning and evening I long eagerly for the honeyed draught of your ruby lip.

4. I am one eager for your ruby lip; every moment my parrot nature scatters honeyed draught and sugar.

5. The heart seeks remedy from the sugar of your ruby lip; that sufferer wants no other cure.

6. Desire has seized the one sick for your forelock; O tress of Leylâ, draw him into chains, link by link.

7. O Nigârî, you have fallen into bonds, do not grieve; Shah Naqshband unties the bond.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The last word of each couplet is repeated at the start of the next, and the ghazal moves forward like a chain: after the opening couplet ending in "çend çend", the second opens with "bend bend"; the couplet ending in "derd-mend" is followed by "derd-mend", "şevk-mend" by "şevk-mend", "kand" by "kand", "müstemend" by "müstemend". The last couplet too takes up the "bend bend" at the end of the one before as "bende". This chained manner works together with the rhyme, since all the repeated words end in the sound "-end" and are written with dâl.

The last link of the chain carries the meaning of the ghazal. "Bend" means in Persian a bond and a chain; in the first and second couplets "bend bend" is used in the sense of joint by joint, node by node. The image of the reed flute comes from here: the ney is a reed jointed node by node and it laments; the lover, all his joints wrapped in love, moans like it. In the sixth couplet "bend" becomes a chain: Leylâ's tress is asked to draw the lover into chains. At the close the poet addresses himself as one fallen into bonds and says the bond will be undone: "Hall eyler bendi Şâh Nakşibend", Shah Naqshband unties the bond.

Naqshband is Baha al-Din Naqshband, after whom the Naqshbandi order is named. His name means "one who binds designs" and contains the word "bend"; the "bend" that keeps turning through the ghazal thus reaches the name of the founder of the order. That the man called on to untie the bond bears a bond in his own name gives the couplet a skilful play on words. Nigârî himself was a sheikh of the Khalidi branch of the Naqshbandi order; the name at the end of the ghazal recalls the founder of the path the poet belonged to.

Bibliography

  • Nigârî, Nigârî Dîvânı, ed. A. Azmi Bilgin, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2017 (e-book, Kültür Eserleri Dizisi 482), poem 135, p. 88. https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/TR-194361/nigari-divani.html
  • Fatih Çınar, "Nakşî-Hâlidî Şeyhi Hamza Nigarî'nin İsteğiyle Yazılan Bir Ehl-i Beyti Müdafaa Risalesi: Risâle fî Ta'n li-men Hâlefe Ali Radıyallahu Teâlâ Anh", Tokat Gaziosmanpaşa Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi Dergisi, VII/1, 2019, pp. 125-150. https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/803338

Online sources