Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün mefâ‘îlün (hezec)

Yiter ‘ışk ehline ey dil mey ü mey-hâne vü sâkî
Vusûl-ı ‘akl u pend ile muhalât oldı mâ-bâkî
Cihân mey-hânesinden çün şarâb-ı şevkdür maksûd
Edir ke’sen ve nâvilhâ elâ yâ eyyühe’s-sâkî
Yazagör safha-i cânda rumûz-ı ‘ilm ü ‘irfânı
Yile mecmû‘a-i ten virmedin nâ-gâh evrâkı
Çıkargıl penbe-ı pindârı sa‘y it gûş-ı hûşuñdan
Sadâ-yı sad kala sît-ı safâ çün tutdı âfâkı
Mücidd ol tâ tecerrüd kebkini düşüresin dâma
Mukayyed ol ola kim olmayasın sayd-ı ıtlâkî
Refîkî hâk-i pây ol başlara tâc olmak isterseñ
Koma elden anı bulmak dilerseñ hüsn-i ahlâkı

In English

1. O heart, wine, tavern and cupbearer suffice the people of love; reaching (God) by reason and counsel, all the rest, has passed among the impossibilities.

2. Since the aim of the world’s tavern is the wine of longing: “Pass a cup around and hand it over, O cupbearer.”

3. Take care to write the signs of knowledge and gnosis on the page of the soul, before the anthology of the body suddenly gives its leaves to the wind.

4. Take the cotton of conceit out of the ear of your mind and strive; for the sound of the fame of delight (“sad kala”, sense unclear) has filled the horizons.

5. Be diligent, so that you may bring down the partridge of detachment into the snare; be bound, so that you may not become the prey of unrestraint.

6. Refîkî, be the dust under feet if you wish to be a crown on heads; do not let it (humility) go if you wish to find good character.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The Leaves of the Body’s Anthology

Read in the world of the nazire anthologies, the third couplet gains a meaning of its own. The body is a “mecmû‘a”, a notebook of gathered leaves; one day the wind will scatter those leaves. The poet advises that the signs of knowledge and gnosis be written on the page of the soul before that time comes. In the model Nizâmî says “yile virdi gül evrâkı”, the morning breeze scattered the leaves of the rose; Refîkî turns the rose’s leaves into the leaves of an anthology. Coming from a poet whose poems have reached us only in anthologies, the phrase cannot help but catch the eye; but what the couplet plainly means is the human body.

Among Refîkî’s known poems this ghazal is one of those with the most openly didactic tone. The second couplet contains an Arabic line: “Edir ke’sen ve nâvilhâ elâ yâ eyyühe’s-sâkî”, that is, pass a cup around and hand it over, O cupbearer. The words are the famous line that opens the divan of Hâfız of Shiraz (“Elâ yâ eyyühe’s-sâkî edir ke’sen ve nâvilhâ”) with its two halves exchanged. The fifth couplet plays with Sufi terms: “tecerrüd” (detachment from the world) is quarry to be brought into the snare like a partridge; the contrast of “mukayyed” (bound) and “ıtlâk” (unrestraint, absoluteness) says that whoever does not bind himself will fall prey to unrestraint. The phrase “sad kala” in the second line of the fourth couplet is unclear; the translation leaves that part open.

The Model of Nizâmî of Konya

Nizâmî’s ghazal “Sabâ zülfüñ kohusından mu‘attar kıldı âfâkı / Cemâlüñ nüshasın gördi yile virdi gül evrâkı” stands opposite this poem as its model in both compilations; the Pervâne heading introduces Nizâmî as a man of Konya and the son of a sheikh. The Pervâne has five couplets; the one missing is the couplet of the cotton of conceit. At the very start the Pervâne reads “Vüṣūl-i ‘aḳl-i bend ile muḥālāt ü mā-bāḳī”, in the second “şarāb-i nābdur”, in the fifth “Becidd ol”.

Bibliography

Online sources