Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilün
Âh kim sevdâ-yı zülfün eyledi rüsvâ beni
La’l-i nâbun çâre-sâzum olmaz ise vâ beni
Sanma benden oldı düşmek ‘ışkuna cânâ beni
Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni
Düşmişem deşt-i gama nâmûs u cânum kalmadı
Kâkülün gibi perîşânum karârum kalmadı
Hâsılı gördükde hüsnün ihtiyârum kalmadı
Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni
Görmeyince tâb-ı ruhsârun gözüm nem tolmadı
Düşmeyince nâr-ı hecre böyle benzüm solmadı
Dostum sevmek seni bi’llâhi benden olmadı
Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni
Gül yüzün şevkiyle dil bülbül gibi nâlân u zâr
Bûy-ı zülf-i sünbülünle cân-ı miskîn bî-karâr
Nergis-i mestün elümde komadı sabr u karâr
Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni
Geldi Şâhî âsitân-ı devlete redd eyleme
Şâh-ı âdilsin mürüvvet bâbını sedd eyleme
Derd-i ‘ışkun ser-nibiştümmiş güneh add eyleme
Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni
In English
1. Alas, passion for your lock has disgraced me; woe to me if your pure ruby lips do not find my remedy. O my soul, do not think my falling in love with you came from me; He who adorned your beauty made me mad for you.
2. I have fallen into the desert of grief; neither my good name nor my life remains. I am distraught like your forelock, I have no rest left; in short, when I saw your beauty I lost my will. He who adorned your beauty made me mad for you.
3. Until I saw the radiance of your cheek my eye did not fill with tears; until I fell into the fire of separation my face did not fade like this. My friend, by God, loving you was not in my power. He who adorned your beauty made me mad for you.
4. With longing for your rose face the heart moans and weeps like a nightingale; with the hyacinth scent of your lock the wretched soul is restless. Your drunken narcissus eye has left me neither patience nor rest. He who adorned your beauty made me mad for you.
5. Şâhî has come to the threshold of fortune; do not turn him away. You are a just shah; do not close the door of generosity. The pain of your love was my written fate; do not count it as a sin. He who adorned your beauty made me mad for you.
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
The poem is a murabba of five stanzas with a refrain, written in the "fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilün" pattern of the remel family of aruz (quantitative metre). In the first stanza the four lines end with the redif (refrain word) "beni" and rhyme on "-â": rüsvâ, vâ, cânâ, şeydâ. The other stanzas use the rhymes "-ârum" with the redif "kalmadı" (karârum, ihtiyârum), "-olmadı" (tolmadı, solmadı, olmadı), "-âr" (zâr, bî-karâr, karâr) and "-edd/-add" with the redif "eyleme" (redd, sedd, add). The word "cânum" in the first line of the second stanza does not fully rhyme with "karârum" and "ihtiyârum"; the word "karâr" serves twice as a rhyme, in the second and fourth stanzas. The refrain is the line "Hüsnüni zîbâ iden itdi sana şeydâ beni". The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last stanza (fol. 80b). It is not known to whom the poem was written.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
The thought of the murabba is gathered in the refrain: He who adorned the beloved's beauty has also made the lover mad for it. Since it is God who created the beauty, the lover's love is also His decree; in this way the poet removes the responsibility for his love from himself. This idea is repeated in the stanzas: in the first stanza falling in love did not come "from me", in the third loving is said, with an oath, "not to have come from me", and in the last the pain of love is called "ser-nibişt", the fate written on the brow. The word "sevdâ" in the first stanza suits the black lock in both its senses, passion and the colour black; in the second stanza the lover's distress is likened to the dishevelled forelock. In the fourth stanza rose, hyacinth and narcissus build a congruence of images (tenasüp).
The language of the last stanza changes: Şâhî has come to the "âsitân-ı devlet", the threshold of fortune; the addressee is a "şâh-ı âdil" (just shah), and he is asked not to close the door of generosity and not to turn the lover away. The plea "do not count it as a sin" is close to the language of the examples Kılıç gives of poems asking for pardon; Kılıç shows that in those poems Bayezid asks his father for pardon and hopes to be forgiven, saying that "a servant is never without fault". This murabba is not among Kılıç's examples, and that the last stanza can be read as a plea for pardon addressed to a ruler is our own reading. The first four stanzas of the poem, on the other hand, are written in the usual language of love addressed to a beloved.
Bibliography
- Filiz Kılıç (ed.), Şâhî Dîvânı (Şehzâde Bâyezîd), Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2018, e-book pp. 145-146, murabba no. 21 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Manzum Eserler 225, fol. 80b); also pp. 34-35 (poems asking for pardon), https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/Eklenti/59394,sahi-divanipdf.pdf.
Online sources
