Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün
Ṣoḥbet-i ṣāḥib-i ‘irfānda taḳṣīr itme
Her ġalaṭ resmi göñül levḥine taḥrīr itme
In English
1. Do not fall short in the company of the man of understanding (Sâhib); do not write every mistaken figure upon the tablet of the heart.
Literary and Historical Commentary
In this couplet of counsel the pen name is hidden inside a compound. "Sâhib-i irfân" means one possessed of knowledge and understanding; the same compound can also be read "Sâhib, the man of understanding". The poet advises the reader not to fall short in the company of the man of understanding, perhaps the poet himself. A pen-name game of this kind is also seen in Sâhib's matla 21, where the pen name was hidden in the compound "Sâhib-makâl" (master of words).
The second line likens the heart to a writing tablet. Every stroke written on the tablet stays there; so neither should every mistaken shape, every faulty thought, be written on the heart. "Tahrîr" means writing, "resm" a stroke or figure; in Sâhib's divan images of writing and the writing set often become the means of moral counsel. That both lines end in "itme" (do not) gives the couplet the air of a list of prohibitions. The couplet has survived only in the manuscript T. 738.
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. 230, matla 23 (Istanbul University Library T. 738, fol. 4b). https://openaccess.firat.edu.tr/handle/11508/16014
Online sources
