View over Doğubeyazıt from the ancient fortress
This deyiş does not appear in the anthologies of Pir Sultan Abdal poems until Cahit Öztelli’s 1971 publication of the ‘complete poems’ (bütün şiirleri). That collection was indeed a more complete collection than earlier anthologies with 297 songs included. However later editions such as the massive work by Ali Haydar Avcı, now run to around 400 texts. The text was collected by the great Sivas folkorist İbrahim Aslanoğlu and was subsequently published in his 1984 book Pir Sultan Abdallar. Interestingly the song was actually recorded by a popular singer, Muazzez Türüng, for Odeon records in 1962 (and recently made available again by Odeon on its album of archival recordings called Harman).
The poem has more of the folksong quality about it and the theme of love, rather than the batınî mystical esoteric qualities of many of the lyrics attributed to Pir Sultan – and is thus somewhat easier to get an English translation. It is one of the Pir Sultan lyrics that so wonderfully evokes the Anatolian landscape, with the image of the nomads migrating across the high plateau. One of the main problems for tranlation include finding the right feel in English for the word suna which is a type of pheasant bird (or as Mehmet Özbek in his new dictionary of folksong terms Türkülerin Dili says, göl ördeği, lake duck). The bird is addressed personally in the song and I believe it needs to be retained in the translation; but a translation like ‘my duck’ is not going to work in English. I have used ‘pheasant’ which is not much better but have added ‘little’ so as to emphasise the intimacy of the conversation and the estrangement of the singer. The second last line of the last verse is also a little problematic in regard to getting the nuances. The word nimet can mean ‘favour’ or ‘blessing’ but also ‘food’ or ‘bread’. The latter would work very well with the verb used (yemek meaning ‘to eat’) but I’m not convinced this is the sense intended; and yemek can also act as an auxillary verb without its literal meaning of ‘to eat’. The last word in this line, helallaşalım, translates well enough as ‘let us fogive all’ but it implies mutal forgiveness and even has the sense of ‘last rites’ as in someone dying. Though tempted I have chosen not to emphasise that finality in the translation. This song was a favourite of a good friend of mine and confessed it sometimes brought him to tears to hear it or play it.
Şu karşı yaylada göç katar katar
Translation: Paul Koerbin
On the high lands opposite they depart in lines
The love of a beauty fumes in my mind
This separation is worse than death to me
It has passed, the beloved caravan, don’t delay me
The one that I love sits at the head
This pain of that beauty destroys me
This separation brings a cruelty upon me
It has passed, the beloved caravan, don’t delay me
If I disappear, my little pheasant, don’t weep for me
Don’t burn my heart in love’s fire
Don’t take love from me to bind to some other
It has passed, the beloved caravan, don’t delay me
If I go let this land be your home
Let the wolf at the hypocrites among us
If I die let the pain be in that one’s heart
It has passed, the beloved caravan, don’t delay me
I am Pir Sultan Abdal let us pass over mountains
Let us pass and come to the loved one’s land
I have had much of your favour let us forgive all
It has passed, the beloved caravan, don’t delay me
————————————————————————————————–
Original text (from Cahit Öztelli Pir Sultan Abdal Bütün Şiirleri)
Şu karşı yaylada göç katar katar
Bir güzel sevdası serimde tüter
Bu ayrılık bana ölümden beter
Geçti dost kervanı eğleme beni
Şu bemin sevdiğim başta oturur
Bir güzelin derdi beni bitirir
Bu ayrılık bana zulüm getirir
Geçti dost kervanı eğleme beni
Ben gidersem sunam bana ağlama
Ciğerimi aşk oduna dağlama
Benden başkasına meyil bağlama
Geçti dost kervanı eğleme beni
Gider isem bu il sana yurt olsun
Munafıklar aramıza kurt olsun
Ben ölürsem yüreğine dert olsun
Geçti dost kervanı eğleme beni
Pir Sultan Abdal’ım dağlar aşalım
Aşalım da dost iline düşelim
Çok nimetin yedim helallaşalım
Geçti dost kervanı eğleme beni
PİR SULTAN ABDAL and me 
Hello, Paul. These days I am trying to find out the cluster of meanings attached to the symbol of “kervan” in alevi mystical poetry. I dare say that in this deyiş the image of caravan is not just a means of conveying the atmosphere of nomadic life but a core mystical image, especially taking into the account the word “dost”, refering to Hakk-Muhammed-Ali in this tradition, even when on the level of literal meaning the earthly beloved is implied. The image of Friend’s caravan serves to set the opposition ot two types of love, for the words of the lyric hero are evidently addressed to a woman trying to prevent him from leaving and catching up with the caravan. What is meant here by ‘Dost kervanı’ ‘is still rather vague for me, though I’ve got some suppositions. I dare think all the words of love and suffering form the first two quatrains refer to the Friend and divine love, rather than to the mundane life and love.
Olga,
I think there may be symbolic meaning derived more from the mystical tradition rather than specific Alevi symobolism. It is interesting that Korkmaz does not include an entry on ‘kervan‘ in his dictionary of Alevi-Bektaşi terms nor does Özbek include an entry in his work on the language of türkü. This suggests to me a reading that is related more to common understanding of the ‘caravan’ symbolism. There is the idea of a journey through life – a little at odds, perhaps, but something like the ‘han‘ with two door representing the journey of life. Even in respect to mystical meanings, Annemarie Schimmel in the various books that I’ve consulted (‘Deciphering the Signs of God‘, ‘The Mystical Dimensions of Islam‘ ‘As Through a Veil‘) gives very little attention to the caravan symbol. She does mention that mystical poets are well aware that the ‘caravan of life’ is constantly moving; and also mentions the ‘caravan bell’ that guides them to sanctuary where the beloved dwells; and so there is a sense of the possibility of being left in the desert and missing the caravan. She also mentions the ‘caravan leader’ as being Muhammad Mustafa.
I guess in the Alevi tradition we could see the kervan as leading to Ali (or his representatives such as Shah Ismail especially in the socio-political lyrics). There is of course the famous poem of Pir Sultan with the lines:
Bir ulu kervandık kalktık Musul’dan
Gitti kervanımız Ali’ye doğru
….
Bize bu ayrılık Haktan verildi
Gitti kervanımız Ali’ye doğru
Dear Paul,
Thank you very much for useful references and a detailed explication of the matter. I agree with you that the symbolism of caravan is to be traced back to the mystical tradition in general. However, in alevi poetry it was evidently endowed with extra meanings not to be found in sunni sufism. There’s a deyş by Pir Sultan Abdal “Onun katarından ayırma bizi”, in which ‘katar’ of the “kervan” is presented as a line of Muhammad’s descendents via Fatima and Ali – 12 Imams. And the caravan is led by Ali himself. In other words, in alevi poetic imagery caravan can represent Ehl-i Beyt.
One minor comment on the translation. To my mınd,”Geçti dost kervanı” is rather an inversion of “Dost geçti kervanı”, which can be heard in some versions of the deyiş when performed. If to interprete “dost” as an attributive noun, it should be translated as “friendly”. Whereas, “friend’s caravan” would be “dostun kervanı”. So, it might be more grammatically correct to translate “Geçti dost kervanı” as “Friend has led away the caravan”. At the same time, we can take into consideration that in Ottoman Turkish it was common to omit case endings, though it concerned mostly accusative case. Probably, the choice of the variant should be based on the semantics of the poem taken as a self-consistent whole.
Olga, I certainly understand you point about the grammatical problems here. As you say the accusative ending is often absent and in this case I suppose I have extended that freedom of interpreting inflection in the lyric form to possessive. The trouble is kervan is in an inflected form which seems most likely to me to be the genitive if we read geçti as intrasitive. The inclusion of ‘dost’ suggested to me that that this refers to the caravan of a beloved one that is departing or at a distance as indeed the the lyric refers to. In this context ‘dost’ could also be vocative “His/her caravan has passed by, beloved”. My translation takes liberties and is not felicitous by any means, but I think dost and kervan are connected here but translating dost as an adjective does have a rather odd sound in English making the caravan sound anthropomorphic, i.e. ‘friendly caravan’. It is certainly worth my while to think some more about a better approach to this line. I could say something like ‘Friend, her caravan has passed’ but my original translation tries to avoid the specificity of gender so that ‘dost’ and the lyric can work at both a human and a mystical level by avoiding the distinciton of gender which is easy in Turkish but not so in English.
I have made a change to this line following consideration of your comments. I am still convinced that dost kervanı should be read as a grammatical unit as in ‘the beloved caravan’, i.e. making it definitive. So I have gone with this direct translation which leaves it in English with some grammatical ambiguity with ‘beloved’ suggesting an adjectival reading but not as blatantly as ‘friendly’; but also suggesting a possessive reading as in ‘caravan of the beloved’ but not as overtly as interpolating a possessive pronoun as in my original translation. I do actually think that leaving ambiguous space in these lyrics is appropriate and even something to strive for. At times I wonder if such approach reflects my lack of understanding; at other times, it seems these lyrics are naturally possessed of this ambiguous or at least immanent space.
Thanks again for your comments which are most useful and cause for thought.
Hello Paul, you have really done a great job in discovering and researching about such a big Alevi turkish poet and historical fıgure. I thought it might have been interesting for the visitors of this page to listen to the poetry in form of a türkü which you have mentioned and explained at this page.
Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yf4rBpvhWSk&list=PL9E0D010EDD3CCA3A