Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Mef’ûlü Mefâ’îlü Mefâ’îlü Fe’ûlün
Bulınmadı bir destüm alur dünyede hayfâ
Tutdum yönümi tapuna ey Hazret-i Mevlâ
Yüz yire koyup şefkat uma kapuna geldüm
Bî-çâre vü mihnet-zede ser-geşte vü şeydâ
İrmezse cenâbundan eger zerre ‘inâyet
Kaldım ebedî gussada hayfâ vü dirîgâ
Rahm eyle gözüm yaşına redd itme kapundan
Yâ Rabb be-hakk-ı kalem u levh-i mu’allâ
Dermân umageldüm harem-i kûyuna nâlân
Ol dil ki sana yüz tuta mahrûm ola hâşâ
Anı ki ura kahrun eli rûy-ı zemîne
Zîr ü zeber olup yata kalkamaya kat’â
Lutfun eli anı ki çeke fevk-ı ‘alâya
Kanda karasın göre anun dîde-i a’dâ
Hayretde durur vasf-ı sıfâtunda bu Şâhî
Zâtundan anun ne dili var kim ola gûyâ
In English
1. Alas, no one was found in this world to take my hand; O Lord Most High, I have turned my face (my direction) towards your door.
2. Helpless, afflicted, bewildered and distraught, I have come to your door with my face to the ground, hoping for compassion.
3. If not a particle of grace reaches me from your presence, I am left in eternal sorrow; alas and alack.
4. O Lord, by the right of the Pen and the exalted Tablet, have mercy on the tears of my eyes, do not turn me away from your door.
5. Moaning, I have come to the sanctuary of your street in hope of a cure; God forbid that a heart which turns its face to you should go without.
6. Whoever the hand of your wrath strikes to the ground lies overturned and can never rise again.
7. Whoever the hand of your grace draws up to the highest heights, where could the enemy's eye catch even his silhouette?
8. This Şâhî stands in bewilderment at describing your attributes; what tongue has he to speak of your essence?
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
This ghazal of eight couplets is written in the "mef'ûlü mefâ'îlü mefâ'îlü fe'ûlün" pattern and is a münacat, a supplication addressed to God. There is no redif; the rhyme is formed by the "-â" sound in the words "hayfâ, Mevlâ, şeydâ, dirîgâ, mu'allâ, hâşâ, kat'â, a'dâ, gûyâ". The pen name appears in the last couplet.
The ghazal is one of the problematic texts of the edition. According to Kılıç's footnote, the last couplet comes before the opening couplet in the manuscript (fol. 2b); since metre and rhyme are the same and the ghazal has no other pen-name couplet, Kılıç took it as the closing couplet. Kılıç also notes that it may belong to a separate ghazal of which only one couplet survived because of a lost leaf. Since the word in the second line of the first couplet contains both the letters "ze" and "nûn", it can be read either "yüzümü" (my face) or "yönümü" (my direction); as Kılıç reports, in the biographical anthology of poets (tezkire) of Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi and in Âlî's Künhü'l-ahbâr the word appears as "yüzümü". The edition reads "yönümi". The presence of the ghazal in these two works shows that it attracted attention among the little-known poems of the divan.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
In the opening couplet the poet, finding no one in the world to take his hand, turns his face to God's door, and this sets the mood of the whole ghazal. The second and fifth couplets portray the attitude of a helpless beggar who comes rubbing his face at the door: the adjectives "bî-çâre, mihnet-zede, ser-geşte, şeydâ" (helpless, afflicted, bewildered, distraught) follow one another. In the fourth couplet an oath is sworn by the right of "the Pen and the exalted Tablet"; this allusion to the Pen and the Preserved Tablet on which destiny is written is a common formula of entreaty in supplications.
The sixth and seventh couplets form a pair of contrasts that complete each other. The hand of wrath strikes a man to the ground and turns him "zîr ü zeber", upside down; the hand of grace draws him up to "fevk-ı 'alâ", the highest height. He who falls cannot rise again, while he who is raised passes even beyond the sight of the enemy. The word "kara" in "kanda karasın göre" means the silhouette made out from afar; this reading is our own. In the last couplet the poet says that he is powerless to describe God's attributes and has no tongue at all to speak of His essence. This distinction between attribute and essence brings into the poem a well-known gradation of the theological and mystical tradition.
Kılıç states that in Bayezid's poems mystical elements are used not in the manner of a Sufi but as instruments within the tradition of divan poetry. Although the loneliness of the first couplet of this supplication lends itself to being connected with the poet's life, there is no information on when the ghazal was written.
Bibliography
- Filiz Kılıç (ed.), Şâhî Dîvânı (Şehzâde Bâyezîd), Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2018, e-book p. 48, ghazal no. 3 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Manzum Eserler 225, fol. 2b); footnotes 85-86; also p. 26 (mystical elements), https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/Eklenti/59394,sahi-divanipdf.pdf.
Online sources
