Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ūlü mefā‘īlü mefā‘īlü fe‘ūlün

Olmaġla ḳarīn niyyet-i ṣıdḳa sefer-i subḥ
Peyveste olur leşker-i Şāma ẓafer-i subḥ
Şeb-būy-ı nücūma ḳomadı raġbet-i ḫāṭır
Açıldıġı dem verd-i sefīd-i seḥer-i subḥ
Seccāde-i sıdḳ üzre ider ‘ābid-i mihri
İşrāḳ namāzına muvaffaḳ es̱er-i subḥ
Encüm ḳadar olursa da ‘add-i siyeh-i şām
Olmaz gözine ḫüsrev-i ‘āli-naẓar subḥ
Ās̱ār-ı ṣabāḥat gibidür ḫaṭ ile ruḫda
Beyninde şeb ü rūzuñ olan zīb ü fer-i subḥ
Gördük reh-i ümmīdi çıḳup żulmet-i şebden
Ḫurşīd ile olduḳda fürūzān-ı fer-i subḥ
Ṣāḥib ruḫ-ı yāre baḳup it dīdeñi tenvīr
Ḫurşīd iledür çünki ḳarīr-i baṣar-ı subḥ

In English

1. Since the campaign of the morning is joined to the intention of sincerity, the victory of the morning reaches the army of Şâm (evening, Damascus).

2. The moment the white rose of the morning opened at dawn, the heart lost its liking for the night-scented stock of the stars.

3. The influence of the morning grants the worshipper sun success in the işrak prayer on the prayer rug of sincerity.

4. Even if the number of the black (soldiers) of evening is as great as the stars, they do not appear in the eye of the lofty-gazed king, the morning.

5. The ornament and splendour of the morning, lying between night and day, are like the traces of beauty along with the down on the cheek.

6. When the splendour of the morning was lit by the sun, we saw the road of hope come out of the darkness of night.

7. Sâhib, look at the beloved's cheek and light up your eye; for the morning's delight of the eye is with the sun.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Dawn appears here in turn as a battle, a garden and a scene of worship, and the redif (refrain word) is "subḥ" (morning) itself. In the first couplet the morning sets out on campaign and defeats the "army of Şâm": "şām" means both evening and the city of Damascus, so the darkness of night becomes an enemy army. The fourth couplet continues the same battle: even if the black soldiers of evening are as many as the stars, the king morning does not deign to notice them. In the second couplet the battle gives way to a garden; the stars, like night-blooming stock, fall from favour when the white rose of the morning opens.

The third couplet sees the morning as a time of prayer. The sun is a worshipper standing on the prayer rug of sincerity, and through the influence of the morning it succeeds in performing the işrak prayer, offered some time after sunrise. Since the word işrak means both "the rising and shining of the sun" and the name of this prayer, the couplet carries a double entendre (tevriye) of its own accord. The fifth couplet ties the ghazal to the beloved: the dawn light between night and day resembles the place where the dark down meets the fair skin of the cheek.

Topal gives the pen-name couplet as an example of Sâhib's pithy, proverb-like sayings. Its wit lies in the idiom "ḳarīr-i baṣar", "delight (literally coolness) of the eye": the morning's eye is lit by the sun, and the lover's eye too should be lit by looking at the beloved's sun-like cheek. In the T. 738 copy the order of the third to sixth couplets differs.

Bibliography

  • Meral Topal, Pîrî-zâde Mehmed Sâhib Hayatı, Edebî Kişiliği, Eserleri ve Divanı'nın Tenkitli Metni, MA thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2004, pp. 103-104, ghazal 10 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Manzum 243, fol. 14b; Istanbul University Library T. 1710/6, fol. 4a; Istanbul University Library T. 738, fol. 6b); also p. 7 (couplet 7). https://openaccess.firat.edu.tr/handle/11508/16014

Online sources