Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Güft ü gûyundı heme cândan elezz ey sâkî
Neş’e-i bâde-i mestâneden elezz ey sâkî
Seg-i dergâhın ile zâviye-i kûyunda
Gezdiğim saltanat şânden elezz ey sâkî

In English

1. O cupbearer, your talk, your conversation, is more delicious than life; more delicious than the joy of the wine that makes drunk, O cupbearer.

2. To wander with the dog of your threshold in the corner of your street is more delicious than the glory of sovereignty, O cupbearer.

Literary and Historical Commentary

In the previous quatrain the refrain was "lezîz", delicious; here "elezz", more delicious, from the same root, is repeated in every line. This comparative, formed in Arabic on the pattern "ef‘al", calls for a comparison, and in each line the poet sets one thing above another. The cupbearer's conversation is more delicious than life and than the joy of wine; wandering in the corner of her street is more delicious than the glory of sovereignty.

The last comparison is the most striking of the quatrain. The lover prefers wandering in the cupbearer's street together with the dog at her door to the glory of a ruler. In divan poetry the dog at the beloved's door is a creature the lover both envies and counts as a companion; to be near it is to be near the beloved. "Zâviye", corner, is also the name of the small lodge where dervishes stayed. The closeness that can be drawn between the corner of the street and the lodge turns the cupbearer's door into a dervish's halting place.

The words before the rhyme, "cândan, mestâneden, şânden", carry the comparison on with the ending "-den", than. With the two quatrains the dâl section closes and the zâl section begins.

Bibliography

Online sources