Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilün

Dil-i tennûr sînede cânâ kebâbum var benüm
Hem iki gözüm iki şîşe şarâbum var benüm

In English

1. O beloved, I have kebab in the oven of the heart within my breast; and my two eyes are two bottles of wine, I have my wine as well (to set before the party).

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The eighth single couplet is written in "fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilün", the pattern most used in the divan. Kılıç's survey counts six Turkish single couplets in this pattern; in the edited text, however, there are seven single couplets in it (1, 3, 8, 12, 13, 15 and 18). The edition does not explain the difference. The couplet is musarra' (both lines rhyme): "kebâbum" and "şarâbum" form the rhyme, and "var benüm" is the redif (refrain word). There is no folio mark in the edition.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet describes the lover's pain as the preparation of a drinking party. In divan poetry the liver or heart burning in the fire of love becomes "kebab", and bloody tears are compared to wine for their colour. Kebab and wine are the two basic elements of the gathering. The poet says that whatever is needed to entertain the beloved is found in his own body: his breast is an oven, his heart kebab, his two eyes two bottles of wine. The comparisons are made as teşbih-i beliğ (simile without a comparative particle). The phrase "dil-i tennûr" reverses the usual order; the meaning can be taken as "the heart that burns like an oven" or as "the oven of the heart", and we have followed the second. There is a clear tenasüp (congruence of images) among oven, kebab, bottle and wine. The word "şîşe" (bottle) also suits the eye well: an eye full of tears is a bottle filled with red liquid. The lightly ironic tone of the couplet, which turns pain into a banquet table, is a different voice beside the divan's serious supplications.

Historical Context

Whom the couplet was written for is not known. The pair of kebab and wine is an image Şâhî is fond of. Summing up the main theme of the divan with the words "hecr" and "fürkat" (separation), Kılıç gives the opening couplets of two ghazals as examples: "Âteş-i mihr-i ruhunla bagrumı kıldun kebâb / Hasret-i câm-ı lebünle eşkümi itdün şarâb" (the sixth ghazal) and "Kıldı hasret gözlerüm yaşın şarâb / İtdi fürkat bagrımun başın kebâb" (the ninth ghazal). This single couplet builds the same pair anew in the image of a banquet table. The same image also appears in the fifteenth murabba: "Âteş-i fürkatle cânâ olalı bagrum kebâb / Bezm-i gamda eyledüm şâhâ gözüm yaşın kebâb". In the second line of that murabba the second "kebâb" in the rhyme position strains the sense, and "şarâb" (wine) would be expected there. Because in this single couplet and in the two ghazals the kebab of the breast or heart and the wine of tears always stand side by side, this strengthens the possibility that the second "kebâb" in the murabba was a "şarâb". This comparison is our own observation; Kılıç does not connect the two.

Bibliography

  • Filiz Kılıç (ed.), Şâhî Dîvânı (Şehzâde Bâyezîd), Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2018, e-book p. 148, single couplet no. 8 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Manzum Eserler 225); also p. 29 (survey of metres) p. 31 (opening couplets of ghazals no. 6 and 9) and p. 141 (murabba no. 15, stanza 5), https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/Eklenti/59394,sahi-divanipdf.pdf.

Online sources