Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Ey hakîkat nûrı ey reşk-âver-i şems-i duhâ
Hâk-i pâyin zerresidir âferînden mâ‘adâ
Kanı bir mehtâb sen tek kanı sen tek şeb-çerâg
Kanı sen tek âf-tâb ey meh mudîen fi's-semâ
Kanı sen tek la‘l-i şîrîn kanı sen tek şâh-ı dîn
Kanı sen tek nâzenîn ey gül bulunmaz fi's-serâ
Kanı sen tek zülf-i sünbül kanı sen tek rûy-ı gül
Kanı sen tek la‘l-i mül ‘âlemde yokdur intihâ
Defter-i zîbâda sen tek bir güzel yokdur bu kim
Eylemiş icrâ kemâlin sende tay itmiş kazâ
Eyledikce fikr-i evsâfın alur hayret beni
Şaşmışam ma‘zûrum er vasfında itsem iktifâ
‘Âcizî vasfın Nigârî bî-nevâ ister kerem
İltifâtından dem-â-dem ey Habîb-i Kibriyâ

In English

1. O light of truth, O you who make the morning sun jealous; even a mote of the dust beneath your feet is beyond praise. (The meaning of the second line is uncertain; "âferîn" can mean both praise and creation.)

2. Where is a moonlight like you, where a night lamp like you; O moon, where is a sun like you shining in the sky?

3. Where are sweet lips like yours, where a king of faith like you; O rose, one as graceful as you is not found on earth.

4. Where are locks like hyacinth, a face like a rose such as yours; where are wine-red lips like yours; in the world (this list) has no end.

5. In the register of beauty there is none as beautiful as you; for fate completed perfection in you and closed the register with you.

6. As I think of your attributes wonder seizes me; I am bewildered, and if I say too little in describing you I am to be excused.

7. Destitute Nigârî, (despite) his inability to describe you, asks generosity of you; O Beloved of God, he awaits your favour at every moment.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The previous naat asked "who is there besides you"; this second naat continues the same praise with the question "kanı sen tek", where is one like you. Two poems standing side by side in the divan state the Prophet's uniqueness through two different question patterns. "Kanı" means "where" in old Anatolian and Azerbaijani Turkish; words of this kind occur often in Nigârî's language and bring the ring of speech into the poem.

Couplets two to four form a series of comparisons. First the sky: moonlight, the night lamp (şeb-çerâg), the sun. Then the earth: sweet lips, the rose, the hyacinth. The Arabic phrases at the end of the second and third couplets make the division explicit: "mudîen fi's-semâ", shining in the sky; "fi's-serâ", on earth. Beauty searches both sky and earth and finds no equal. All the elements of beauty that belong to the beloved in divan poetry (locks, cheek, lips) are used here to describe the Prophet; in Nigârî the boundary between naat and ghazal often loses its sharpness.

In the fifth couplet the "defter-i zîbâ", the register of beauty, is imagined as a ledger. Fate (kazâ) has written all the beautiful ones into this register and closed it by writing the Prophet last. The idea of the previous naat, that beauty reached its end in him, turns here into an image of writing. In the sixth and seventh couplets the theme of incapacity, worked in the divan's first ghazals, returns: the poet apologises for cutting short in his bewilderment and hopes for favour despite the shortfall of his praise. Its long "â" rhyme keeps this naat, too, within the elif section.

Bibliography

Online sources