Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefâ’îlün Mefâ’îlün Fe’ûlün

Tahammül n’eydi cânâ hecr-i rence
Mukarrermişse irmek vasl-ı gence
Çıkardı perdeden kaçmazdı rızvân
Melâhatde eger varmışsa sence
Tahammülde belâ-yı hecre Ferhâd
Ne cânı var ki ola bile bence
Senün ey âfitâb-ı ‘âlem-ârâ
Sa’âdetdür yüzün görmek toyınca
Kaçan koçam diyü Şâhî miyânın
Derûnum içre cânum kaldı kılca

In English

1. O beloved, if reaching the treasure of union is decreed, what is it to endure the toil of separation?

2. If there were one like you in beauty, Rıdvan would bring her out from behind the veil and would not hide her.

3. In enduring the affliction of separation, what strength has Ferhad to be my equal?

4. O world-adorning sun, it is bliss to look at your face to one's heart's content.

5. While Şâhî waited, saying "When shall I embrace your waist?", my soul within me was left as thin as a hair.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The five-couplet ghazal is written in the "mefâ'îlün mefâ'îlün fe'ûlün" pattern. According to Kılıç's list, this pattern is used in twenty Turkish ghazals of the divan. The ghazal has no redif. The rhyme scheme is loose: the words "rence, gence, sence, bence" meet in the sound "-ence", while "toyınca" and "kılca" come close to this sound only in their last syllables. In the edition the folio mark [49b] stands after the third couplet.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The opening couplet sets against each other in the rhyme the words "renc" (toil, pain) and "genc" (treasure), often mentioned together in divan poetry. The likeness of sound between the two words brings out the contrast in meaning: to reach the treasure one must endure toil. The poet says this in the form of a question; if union is decreed, enduring separation is of no account.

The second couplet is obscure. Rıdvan is known as the keeper of paradise. The couplet can be understood as "if there were one like you in beauty, Rıdvan would bring her out from behind the veil and would not hide her", that is, not even in paradise is there anyone like the beloved. This reading is ours. The third couplet uses the allusion to Ferhad. Ferhad, with the patience that bored through the mountain, is the most enduring hero of the path of love; the poet says that not even Ferhad can measure up to him in enduring separation. This is a familiar example in divan poetry of the lover holding his own pain above that of the great lovers.

The fourth couplet is a simple praise; the beloved is the world-adorning sun, and to look at her face to one's heart's content is bliss. Considering that one cannot gaze one's fill at the sun, the wish in the couplet also carries a small impossibility within it; this observation is ours. The word "toyınca" (doyunca, to one's fill) carries the pronunciation of Old Anatolian Turkish. The closing couplet uses the comparison between the slender waist and a hair. In divan poetry the beloved's waist is imagined as thin as a hair, even so thin as to be almost non-existent. The poet reverses this comparison: what grows thin, what is left as thin as a hair while waiting to embrace the waist, is his own soul. A closeness of sound may also be sensed between the verb "koçmak" (to embrace) and the word "kılca" (as a hair). There is no sign in the ghazal of the addressee's identity.

Bibliography

  • Filiz Kılıç (ed.), Şâhî Dîvânı (Şehzâde Bâyezîd), Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2018, e-book p. 111, ghazal no. 134 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Manzum Eserler 225, fol. 49b); also p. 29 (metres), https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/Eklenti/59394,sahi-divanipdf.pdf.

Online sources