Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Gãlibâ reng-i lebinden ey sanem gül-gûn şarâb
Şerm-sâr olmuş ki ol tutmuş tarîk-ı ihticâb
Pâymâl it pertevin boz revnakın bir subh-dem
Şerm-sâr olsun ki çık bî-perde ey meh âf-tâb
Eylemiş sad-pâre urmuş bağrımı âteşlere
Çeşm-i hûn-hârın şarâb içmez meger kim bî-kebâb
Gördüm agyârı sürülmüş âstânından bu şeb
Berk-ı âhım nâle-i sûzum ana atmış şihâb
Yok mudur câize-i tab‘ım [ki] ey büt subh u şâm
Nazm ile şehnâme-i vasfını yazmış bâb bâb
Bârgâhından kenâr olmak ne mümkin beyle kim
Gerdenim ol turra-i tarrârdandır bir tınâb
Lutf-ı Mevlâdır ki ey Mîr Nigârî yohsa kim
Gayr-i mümkindir sana bulmak kemâl-i âf-tâb

In English

1. O idol, the rose-red wine must have been ashamed before the colour of your lips, for it has taken the path of veiling itself.

2. O moon, come out unveiled one morning so that the sun may be ashamed; trample its light underfoot, spoil its brilliance.

3. Your blood-drinking eye has torn my breast into a hundred pieces and thrown it into the fire; it seems it does not drink wine without kebab.

4. Tonight I saw the strangers driven from your threshold; the lightning of my sighs, my burning moan, had hurled a shooting star at them.

5. O idol, is there no reward for my nature, which morning and evening has written in verse, chapter by chapter, the Shahname of your praise?

6. In this case how could I leave your pavilion; my neck is tied by a rope from that deceitful forelock.

7. O Mîr Nigârî, this is the Lord's favour; otherwise it would be impossible for you to reach the perfection of the sun.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The fourth couplet carries a Quranic scene into the gathering of love. The suras al-Mulk and al-Jinn tell that the heavens have been adorned with stars and that these stars are "şihâb", fiery missiles hurled at devils who try to steal news from the sky. In Nigârî's couplet the strangers (ağyâr), the rivals driven from the door, take the place of the devils; the missile hurled at them is the lightning of the lover's sighs and his burning moan. The beloved's door becomes a guarded heaven, and the strangers the devils trying to slip in.

In couplet five the poet appears before the beloved like a court poet. "Câize" is the reward given in the Ottoman palace to a poet presenting a kaside or a work. The poet says he has written the beloved's praise chapter by chapter like a "şehnâme", praising her on the scale of an epic, and asks for his reward. This relation between the poem of praise and its patron is transferred here into the language of love.

The first three couplets move between wine and blood. Rose-red wine, ashamed before the colour of the beloved's lips, has veiled itself; the sun too is to be shamed before the moon-faced one coming out unveiled. The third couplet works the image of the liver as kebab: kebab is eaten as a relish beside wine, and the lover's burned liver becomes kebab for the beloved's wine. The blood-drinking eye drinks its wine only with this kebab. In the sixth couplet the lover's neck is tied by a "tınâb", a tent rope, from the beloved's forelock, and he cannot leave the pavilion. "Âf-tâb" (the sun) rhymes twice, putting the ghazal's shamed sun to the fore; the other rhymes (şarâb, ihticâb, kebâb, şihâb, bâb, tınâb) are the words of the scenes discussed above and meet on "-âb".

Bibliography

Online sources