Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Zülfin ruḫı üstinde ḳılup bād müşevveş
Her dem nice miskīnüñ urur ḳalbine āteş
Ḫūn olduġına derd ile dildārı olur şād
Rengīn olıcaḳ ḫāne belī ṭıfla gelür ḫvaş
Mestāne gözüñ türk-i kemāndār olalıdan
Oldı cigerüm ġamzelerüñ tīrine terkeş
Pervānelerin yaḳmaḳ içün āteş-i ‘ışḳa
Geymişdi yine şem‘ gibi cāme-i zerkeş
Her laḥẓa ḫayālüñle nigārā dil-i Ca‘fer
Bir ḫāne durur naḳş-ı nigārıyla münaḳḳaş

In English

1. When the wind dishevels her tresses over her cheek, at every moment it sets fire to the hearts of many a poor wretch.

2. When the heart turns to blood with pain, the beloved is glad; yes, when the house is gaily coloured, it pleases the child.

3. Since your drunken eye became a Turkish archer bearing a bow, my liver has become a quiver for the arrows of your glances.

4. To burn the moths in the fire of love she had again put on, like a candle, a garment worked with gold thread.

5. O beauty, at every moment Ca'fer's heart, through your image, is a house adorned with the picture of the beloved.

Literary and Historical Commentary

A Coloured House

A decorated, colourful house pleases a child, and the second couplet grows out of this everyday observation. The heart, dyed with blood by pain, has become a "coloured" house; and the beloved, like a child, is glad to see it. The beloved's pleasure in the lover's suffering is likened to something as innocent and careless as a child's delight in a decorated room. Erünsal counts this couplet among his examples of eye rhyme. Its rhyme word "ḫvaş" (pleasant) is written in Arabic letters "ḫ-v-ş" and looks as if it ended in "-eş" like the other rhymes of the ghazal, but it is read "hoş". The rhyme words are müşevveş, āteş, ḫvaş, terkeş, zerkeş and münaḳḳaş.

The third couplet is built in the language of archery. The beloved's drunken eye is a Turkish archer bearing a bow; the lover's liver has become the quiver (terkeş) carrying that archer's arrows of glances. The arrows gathered in the liver are ranged like arrows in a quiver. The beloved of the fourth couplet has put on a garment worked with gold thread (zerkeş) to burn the moths; the candle, too, wears its golden flame like a garment and burns the moths by drawing them to itself.

On Kâsım Paşa's Ground

The model, by the arrangement of Nazmî's anthology, is the ghazal of Kâsım Paşa, who wrote as Sâfî, beginning "Gün gibi ‘ayân olmaga ol tal‘at-i mehveş". After Kemalpaşazâde's response comes Câfer Çelebi; he is followed by Vasfî, Sabâyî, Hadîdî, Münîr, Fehmî-i Saruhanî and Nazmî. The pen-name couplet makes the lover's heart a house whose walls are adorned with the beloved's picture; the "coloured house" of the second couplet becomes in this last couplet a painted house. In the metre line the edition's misprint "Mefā‘ilü" is given as "mefā‘īlü". Of the manuscripts, the Hâlet Efendi copy reads "yār" (the beloved) for "bād" (the wind) in the first couplet; the "dildārı" of the second appears as "dil dilber" in the Paris, Ayasofya and Hâlet Efendi copies.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • İsmail E. Erünsal (ed.), Tâcî-zâde Ca‘fer Çelebi Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yay., 2018 (e-book), pp. 378-379, ghazal no. 75. https://ekitap.ktb.gov.tr/TR-211662/taci-zade-cafer-celebi-divani.html
  • İsmail E. Erünsal, "Ca‘fer Çelebi'nin Edebî Kişiliği", introduction to Tâcî-zâde Ca‘fer Çelebi Dîvânı, Ankara: T.C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yay., 2018 (e-book), p. 66 and note 294 (eye rhyme). ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Academic studies

  • İsmail E. Erünsal, The Life and Works of Tâcî-zâde Ca‘fer Çelebi, with a Critical Edition of His Dîvân, PhD thesis, University of Edinburgh, 1977, vol. 2, ghazal no. 75 (variants). https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/17182

Official sources

Online sources