Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilâtün Fâ’ilün
Rûhı râhat itmedür hüsnün temaşâdan garaz
Kalbi sâfî eylemekdür rûy-ı zîbâdan garaz
‘Âşıka dîdârdur mahbûb-ı ra’nâdan garaz
Seyr-i dil-berdür ser-i kûy-ı dil-ârâdan garaz
Zevk u ‘işretdür şehâ firdevs-i a’lâdan garaz
Hâr-ı gamda bülbül-i cânı helâk itmek neden
Yire urup gönlümi pâ-mâl ü hâk itmek neden
Gonce agzun hasretiyle derd-nâk itmek neden
Yakamı gül gibi her dem çâk çâk itmek neden
Def’-i gamdur sâkiyâ hod câm-ı sahbâdan garaz
Ey ki ‘ışkından garaz vasl ise maksûdun senün
Bâda virdün nakd-i ‘ömri yok durur sûdun senün
Kalma şehvânîde varsa tab’-ı mahmûrun senün
Dünye vü ‘ukbâ ise makbûl ü merdûdun senün
‘Âşıka dîdârdur dünyâ vü ‘ukbâdan garaz
Gonce-veş kan yut dehân açma sakın ey ‘andelîb
Kim kafada dikilüp gözler ki râz ile rakîb
Gayradur meyli gülün yok yire ötme ey garîb
Minber-i şâh üzre gülşende dikilsen ger hatîb
Yârdan şekvâ mı kılmakdur bu gavgâdan garaz
Her kaçan reftâre gelse Şâhî serv-i kadd-i yâr
Şevk ile tahsîn idüp el yirde kor şâh-ı çenâr
Serv bil haddüni öykünme katline zinhâr
Servde olmaz Celâlî sâye ile berg ü bâr
Zeyn-i gülzâr olmadur serv-i dil-ârâdan garaz
In English
1. The purpose of gazing at beauty is to give the soul rest; the purpose of a lovely face is to make the heart pure. For the lover, the purpose of a graceful beloved is to see that face. (Celâlî's couplet:) The purpose of the head of the heart-adorning beloved's street is to gaze on the heart-stealer; O shah, the purpose of highest paradise is delight and joy.
2. Why destroy the nightingale of the soul on the thorn of grief, why strike my heart to the ground, trample it and turn it to dust, why make me suffer with longing for that rosebud mouth? (Celâlî's couplet:) Why tear my collar to shreds at every moment like the rose? O cupbearer, the purpose of the cup of red wine is, after all, to drive away grief.
3. O you whose purpose in love is union, you have given the coin of your life to the wind and have no profit at all. If you have a languid, wine-sick nature, do not linger in the desires of the flesh. (Celâlî's couplet:) If this world and the next are what you accept and reject, know that for the lover the purpose of this world and the next is to see the beloved's face.
4. O nightingale, swallow blood like the rosebud and take care not to open your mouth, for the rival stands behind you, watching for the secret. The rose inclines to another; O stranger, do not sing in vain. (Celâlî's couplet:) If you stand like a preacher on the pulpit of the branch in the rose garden, is your purpose in this quarrel to complain of the beloved?
5. O Şâhî, whenever the beloved's cypress stature begins to sway in its walk, the plane tree's branch applauds it with longing and lays its hand on the ground. O cypress, know your limit and never try to imitate that stature. (Celâlî's couplet:) O Celâlî, the cypress gives neither shade nor leaf nor fruit; the purpose of the heart-adorning cypress is to be the ornament of the rose garden.
Literary and Historical Commentary
Structure of the Poem
The poem is a tahmis of five stanzas. A tahmis is a musammat built by placing three lines in the same metre before each couplet of another poet's ghazal (gazel); every stanza has five lines, and the last two are a couplet of the original ghazal. The ghazal used here belongs to a poet with the pen name (mahlas) Celâlî. Şâhî's pen name appears in the first line of the last stanza and Celâlî's in the fourth; that both poets' pen names appear together in the last stanza is a known rule of the form. The metre is the "fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilâtün fâ'ilün" pattern of the remel family of aruz (quantitative metre). The redif (refrain word) of the ghazal is "garaz" (purpose). In the first stanza all five lines end in "-âdan garaz"; in the other stanzas Şâhî's three lines rhyme with the first line of Celâlî's couplet ("neden", "senün", "-îb", "-âr"), and the fifth line returns to the redif of the ghazal.
According to Kılıç's description, in the single manuscript of the divan this tahmis comes after the single couplets and before the murabbas (fols. 65a-65b). The heading in the edition is "Tahmîs-i Şâhî rahmetu'llâhi te'âlâ". That the poet is named with the prayer "may God's mercy be upon him" suggests that the heading was written after Bayezid's death; this is our own reading. The edition does not say who Celâlî was, and we have not been able to verify which of the poets using this pen name is meant.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
The central idea of the ghazal rests on the word "garaz", purpose: each couplet states the true purpose of something. The purpose of gazing at beauty is to rest the soul, the purpose of wine is to drive away grief, and for the lover the purpose of this world and the next is to see the beloved's face. The lines Şâhî adds prepare a reason for these judgements. In the second stanza three questions with the redif "neden" (why) lead up to Celâlî's line "why tear my collar to shreds like the rose"; the scattered petals of the opening rose are likened to a torn collar.
In the fourth stanza the nightingale is told to swallow its blood like the rosebud and keep silent, because the rival is watching from behind and the rose inclines to another. In Celâlî's couplet the nightingale is likened to a preacher delivering the sermon from the branch in the rose garden; the word "şâh" means both branch and shah, and the phrase "minber-i şâh" carries both senses together. In the last stanza the plane tree's branch "laying its hand on the ground" presents the drooping of the hand-shaped plane leaf as a hand applauding the beloved's stature; this observation is our own. The word "katline" in the third line seems in context to call for the reading "kaddine" (to the stature); we note this without changing the text. Celâlî's last couplet says that the cypress has no shade or fruit and is only an ornament of the garden. Şâhî ties the stanza to the ghazal's judgement by placing the beloved's stature above this cypress.
Bibliography
- Filiz Kılıç (ed.), Şâhî Dîvânı (Şehzâde Bâyezîd), Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Kütüphaneler ve Yayımlar Genel Müdürlüğü, 2018, e-book pp. 128-129, tahmis no. 1 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Efendi, Manzum Eserler 225, fols. 65a, 65b); also p. 27 (arrangement of the divan), https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/Eklenti/59394,sahi-divanipdf.pdf.
- İskender Pala - Filiz Kılıç, "Musammat", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 31, Ankara 2020, pp. 233-235, https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/musammat.
Online sources
