Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Tut ümîdi bî-vefânun va’de vü peymânına
Kim bilir şâyed gele bir gün vefâ meydânına
Her ne denlü hâk-pây olsam yolında ol mehin
Sâye salmaz üstüme ermez elim dâmânına
Âfitâbım seyl-i eşkim âlemi gark etmesin
Bir nazar kıl ben gubârın dîde-i giryânına

In English

1. Set your hope on the promise and the pledge of the faithless one; who knows, perhaps one day she will come to the field of faithfulness.

2. However much I become the dust beneath the feet of that moon-faced one on her way, she casts no shadow over me, my hand does not reach her skirt.

3. My sun, let not the flood of my tears drown the world; cast one glance at the weeping eye of me, a mote of dust.

Literary and Historical Commentary

At first reading the opening couplet looks like advice, but it is full of an ironic hope: trusting the word of the faithless still holds a chance, for who knows, perhaps one day she will come to the "field of faithfulness". The word meydan (field, arena) makes the beloved's showing faithfulness look like entering a contest, stepping into the lists.

In the second and third couplets a contrast between heavenly bodies and earth is at work. In the second couplet the beloved is "meh", the moon; the lover is "hâk-pây", the earth beneath her feet. The moon gives light but casts no shadow; since "sâye salmak" (to cast a shadow) is the idiom for a great man's protection, the line points both to the nature of the moon and to the beloved's indifference. In the third couplet the beloved is "âfitâb", the sun. The flood of the lover's tears has grown large enough to drown the world, and the flood can dry only under the sun's gaze. The lover calls himself "gubâr": the mote of dust that becomes visible in sunlight. The mote looking to the sun, and the sun making the mote visible, rest on the familiar bond between the mote and the sun in divan poetry.

Hüsameddin gives the piece with the note "Ve lehû"; it looks like the opening couplet of a ghazal followed by two more. Neither the whole ghazal nor the person it addressed is on record. For Sıdkı's four terms as chief scribe and his other poems, see Sıdkı Mustafa Pasha.

Bibliography

Online sources