Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

N’ola cān ile dil olsa bu la‘l-i nābdan maḥẓūẓ
Olur ṣarrāf olanlar cevher-i nā-yābdan maḥẓūẓ
Göñül düzdidür itmez ḥaẓ ḫaṭı ḫaddi ẓuhūrından
Ki olmaz uġrılar hergiz şeb-i mehtābdan maḥẓūẓ
Yoluñda ölmege cān virse ṭañ mı ‘āşıḳ-ı ṣādıḳ
Ḳatı mest olıcaḳ ādem olur çün ḫvābdan maḥẓūẓ
Gözüm çün ṭopṭolu ḳandur aña göster leb-i la‘lüñ
Demi ġālib olan merdüm olur ‘unnābdan maḥẓūẓ
‘Aceb midür leb-i dilber içerse ḳanumı Ca‘fer
Sebük-rūḥ olan olur çün şarāb-ı nābdan maḥẓūẓ

In English

1. Is it any wonder if soul and heart delight in this pure ruby lip? Those who are jewellers delight in a rare gem.

2. The heart is a thief; it takes no pleasure in the appearing of the down and the cheek. Thieves never take pleasure in a moonlit night.

3. Is it any wonder if the true lover gives his soul to die on your path? When a man is very drunk, he takes pleasure in sleep.

4. Since my eye is filled to the brim with blood, show it your ruby lip; a man in whom blood prevails benefits from the jujube.

5. O Ca'fer, is it any wonder if the beloved's lip drinks my blood? One who is light of spirit takes pleasure in pure wine.

Literary and Historical Commentary

A General Rule in Every Couplet

All the couplets of the ghazal are built on the same pattern: the first line states a condition of the lover or the beloved, and the second supports it with a general rule known to all. The jeweller delights in a precious stone, the thief shuns a bright night, the drunk man craves sleep, the light-spirited man loves pure wine. This pattern, which Erünsal describes in his introduction, of stating an idea in the first line and explaining or supporting it in the second, is repeated in every couplet of this ghazal. The refrain "maḥẓūẓ" means pleased, delighted, and the rhyme before it is built on "-āb": nāb, nā-yāb, mehtāb, ḫvāb, ‘unnāb, nāb. The word "nāb" (pure) qualifies the ruby of the lip in the opening couplet and the wine in the pen-name couplet.

The heart becomes a thief in the second couplet. The beloved's cheek is bright as the moon; just as a thief dislikes a bright night, the heart is uneasy at the cheek's appearing, since it wants to steal in secret. The Paris and Cairo copies read "ḫaṭ-ı ḫaddi" for "ḫaṭı ḫaddi" in this couplet.

Jujube and Blood

The fourth couplet uses the language of old medicine. The lover's eye has filled with blood from weeping; this resembles the condition of a patient "in whom blood prevails". In humoral medicine blood is one of the four humours, and its excess is counted a disease. The jujube is a red fruit held in this medicine to be good against an overflow of blood. The beloved's red lip is this jujube; the lover asks for it to be shown to his bloodshot eye as a cure. The word "dem" means both blood and breath or moment; the Paris copy's reading "Dem-i ġālib" shifts this ambiguity a little.

The pen-name couplet turns the lip into a drinker of the lover's blood; as the light-spirited man takes pleasure in pure wine, so the lip delights in drinking blood. The likening of blood to wine is a known image in divan poetry. Two further variants in the thesis fall in the third and fourth couplets: the Cairo copy reads "yoluña" for "yoluñda", and the Paris copy "kim" for "çün". Nazmî's anthology does not contain the ghazal.

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. 383-384, ghazal no. 81. 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. 59 (the pattern of idea and supporting statement in a couplet). 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. 81 (variants). https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/17182

Online sources