Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mefā‘ilün fe‘ilātün mefā‘ilün fe‘ilün

Beni ḳo ḥālüme vā‘iẓ senüñle kārum yoḳ
Benüm güzelleri sevmekde iḫtiyārum yoḳ
Ne yirde kim yürüde ayaġı ṭurup sākī
Ben anda ayıġ oturmaġa iḳtidārum yoḳ
Baṣar ḳara yire baṣmaz ayaġını yüzüme
Yanında ḫāk-i siyeh deñlü i‘tibārum yoḳ
Senüñ benüm gibi her yirde nice yāruñ var
Benüm cihānda velī senden özge yārum yoḳ
Ġamıyle eglenürem müstedām ola Ca‘fer
K’anuñ gibi daḫi bir yār-ı ġamgüsārum yoḳ

In English

1. O preacher, leave me to my state, I have no business with you; I have no choice in loving the beautiful.

2. Wherever the cupbearer rises to his feet and the cup goes round, I have no strength to sit there sober.

3. She treads on the black earth, but does not tread on my face; beside her I have not even the worth of black earth.

4. You have many lovers like me everywhere; but I have no beloved in the world but you.

5. Ca'fer amuses himself with grief for her; may it last for ever, for I have no other friend like it to dispel my grief.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Cup and Sober

The ghazal is one of the plainest in language in Câfer Çelebi's divan. In its five couplets there is almost no Persian construction; the sentences are built in the order of everyday Turkish and carry the tone of conversation. The opening couplet addresses the preacher: "Beni ḳo ḥālüme" (leave me to my state), "senüñle kārum yoḳ" (I have no business with you). The lover does not count loving the beautiful as his own choice; it lies outside his will. Every rhyme word ends in "-ārum" and is followed by the refrain "yoḳ" (there is no): kārum, iḫtiyārum, iḳtidārum, i‘tibārum, yārum, ġamgüsārum.

The second couplet rests on a play of words in old Turkish. Besides meaning foot, the word "ayaḳ" also meant a cup, a drinking vessel. "Ayaġı yürümek" is both the cupbearer's rising and walking and the cup's going round from hand to hand. The word "ayıġ" (sober) in the line also stands close in sound to "ayaġ": where the cup goes round, no one sits sober. Here the Ayasofya and Hâlet Efendi copies have "buyura" for "yürüde", while the Paris copy begins the second line "Benüm anda oturmaġa".

Black Earth and a Friend in Grief

The third couplet conveys a feeling of jealousy and humiliation through a concrete picture. As she walks, the beloved treads on the black earth but not on the lover's face; beside her the lover is not valued even as much as black earth. In divan poetry the lover's counting himself the dust of the beloved's foot is a known image of humility; here the lover falls behind even that dust. The fourth couplet is an unadorned comparison: the beloved has many lovers everywhere, while the lover has no one but her.

The pen-name couplet ends on a reversal. The lover amuses himself with the grief the beloved gives and wishes that grief to last, since he has no other friend to dispel his grief. "Ġamgüsār" means a friend who dispels grief, who consoles; here the friend who dispels grief is grief itself. The ghazal found no place in Nazmî's anthology.

Bibliography

Online sources