Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün

O şūḫun leẕẕet-i ṣad-gūne var bāġ-ı cemālinde
Olur her nev‘-i mīve ḳāmet-i ṭūbā miṡālinde
Gül-i şeh-rāh-ı kūyuñ ṭıyn-ı maḫtūm eylemişdür āb
Celīdür raḫş-ı yārüñ bu eṡer naḳş-ı ni‘ālinde
Ṭa‘ām-ı ḥār beytinde ṭa‘ām-ı bāridāsādur
Bürūdetgāh gāhī ülfet-i germüñ ḫilālinde
O māhı doġruluḳdan ṣoḥbet-i aġyāre döndürmez
Elifāsā kec olmaz infiṣāl u ittiṣālinde
Büt-i nev-sāl ile bāzār-ı vuṣlat eylemek güçdür
Bu maḥẕūr olmaz ammā dil-berānuñ köhne sālinde
Olur nīş-i kederden ḫāṭır-ı hem-vāre vāreste
Bu zünbūr-ı cihānuñ olmayan mūmında balında
Kimüñ kim ḫāṭırından ibn-i vaḳt olmaḳ geçer Ṣāḥib
Ḳoyup müstaḳbel ü māżīyi olsun kendi ḥālinde

In English

1. In the garden of that coquette's beauty there are a hundred kinds of delight; every sort of fruit grows on a stature like the Tûbâ tree.

2. Water has turned the rose of the highway of your street into sealed earth; this trace is plain in the pattern of the shoes of the beloved's horse.

3. In the house of hot food it is like cold food; at times a chill comes in the midst of a warm friendship. The arrangement of the couplet is obscure; a likeness resting on old medicine's division of foods into hot and cold can be sensed.

4. Straightness does not turn that moon towards the company of strangers; like the letter elif, she does not bend, whether set apart or joined.

5. It is hard to strike a bargain of union with a young idol; but this obstacle no longer stands once the beauties are on in years.

6. The mind of one who has no eye for the wax and honey of this bee of the world is ever free of the sting of sorrow.

7. Sâhib, whoever has it in mind to be a "son of the moment", let him leave the future and the past and be at peace in his own state.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The fourth couplet draws a moral from a rule of Arabic script. Elif is one of the letters that do not join the letter after them; in writing, whether it stands alone or is attached to the letter before, its shape does not change and it always stays upright. Sâhib likens the beloved's straightness to this letter: whether she comes together with strangers or parts from them, she does not bend. The comparison adds a detail of penmanship to the divan tradition that pairs the uprightness of elif with stature and with honesty.

Sâhib's signature couplet draws on a well-known Sufi expression. "İbnü'l-vakt", "son of the moment", is the Sufi who lives the present moment, caught neither by regret for the past nor by worry for the future. The poet turns the idea into counsel: whoever wishes to be a son of the moment must leave the past and the future behind. The sixth couplet goes the same way; the world is like a bee that has wax and honey but stings, and whoever does not covet its honey escapes its sting as well.

"Tîn-i mahtûm", in couplet two, is the healing earth, stamped with a seal, mentioned in the old books of remedies. When the beloved's horse passes along the muddy road of the street, the print of its shoe is pressed into the earth like a seal; the dust of the road is thus turned into a precious medicine. Tûbâ, at the start of the poem, is the tree of paradise that bears every kind of fruit, and the beloved's stature is likened to it.

The fifth couplet is an open jest about the age of beauties. One copy reads the couplet differently; the thesis does not give the variant.

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, p. 187, ghazal 86 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Manzum 243, fol. 30b; Istanbul University Library T. 1710/6, fol. 14b; Istanbul University Library T. 738, fol. 22b). https://openaccess.firat.edu.tr/handle/11508/16014

Online sources