Aşık Mücrimi ‘Şu diyâr-ı gurbet elde’ (Şen değil gönlüm şen değil)

25 Wednesday Apr 2012

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Arif Sağ, Aşık Mücrimi, Aşık Meluli, Aşık İbreti, Cafer Ağa, mahlas, Müslüm Gürses, Nesimi Çimen, Ulaş Özdemir

The performer and musicologist Ulaş Özdemir in his published collection of Mücrimi’s lyrics considers him alongside Aşık Melûli and Aşık İbreti as the great representative aşık-s of their time. This is Mücrimi’s most famous song, associated particularly with Aşık Nesimi Çimen and undoubtedly helped to the status of a classıc by superb recordings of the song by Arif Sağ on his 1983 recording İnsan Olmaya Geldim and later by Müslim Gürses on his 2001 recording Müslüm’ce Türküler. Sağ’s version is restrained, tempered with space that lets the song unfold profoundly – as is typical of that remarkable album. Gürses’s singing has a more searing quality and is beautifully delivered, like Sağ, just to bağlama accompaniment.

Mücrimi whose real name was Mehmet Özbozok was born in 1882 in Karaterzi village in the Doğanşehir locale of the Malatya region. Özdemir tells us that according to the explanation of Mücrimi’s children he was given the mahlas ‘Mücrimi’ by a descendent of İmam Mûsâ’l-Kâzım. As a child he burned his hand resulting in his fingers being bandaged in the shape of a ball and he was given the nickname ‘çolak‘ meaning crippled or one-armed. And this nickname was apparently the inspiration for the mahlas Mücrimi which has connotations of being guilty or a criminal. Mahlas taking is a fascinating subject and here we can see elements of bestowing authority of lineage, reference to the specifics of one’s life or appearance and ironic humour.

Aşık Nesimi Çimen spent some time with Mücrimi but, again according to what Özdemir reports, the song came to Çimen through his father-in-law Cafer Ağa of Sarız (Elbistan) who Mücrimi had great regard for. It was through Nesimi Çimen’s singing the song in various gatherings that it entered the repertoire of other artists; and later became part of the official TRT repertoire. In my PhD thesis I discussed another song Arif Sağ collected from the singing of Nesimi Çimen (and included on İnsan Olmaya Geldim) called ‘Yarim İçin Söylüyorum’, a song in türkü form although it has the suggestion of a mahlas in the line ‘Cafer der sevdalı kuldu’. At the time of writing my thesis I stated that I could not identify the poet ‘Cafer’, but now I would conclude that it appears highly probable that this Cafer is none other than Cafer Ağa.

The commonly performed versions omit the third verse (the ‘oh Lord’ verse) and alter the penultimate line of the last verse. That line certainly presents the biggest translation challenge. In the recorded versions this line is changed to ‘zalımlardan [or cahillerden] yedi taşı‘ and I have been guided by this variant in my translation. Even still it requires some interpretation since it would seem to be a reference to the Muslim ‘stoning of devil’ ritual personalised and inverted in a typically deft Alevi way. I translate ‘intizar’ as an ‘expectation’ or ‘waiting’ although it may also mean a ‘curse’ though I don’t think so in this context – though it is a shade of meaning unfortunately lost in translation.

Aşık Mücrimi: Şu diyâr-ı gurbet elde

Translation: Paul Koerbin

In exile in this strange land

No joy, my heart knows no joy

No one knows of my condition

No joy, my heart knows no joy

I caused my heart injury and pain

My heart descended into despair

Whether fortune or fate, it is black

No joy, my heart knows no joy

I have wept, make me laugh, oh Lord

I am broken down, raise me up, oh Lord

My condition is clear to you, oh Lord

No joy, my heart knows no joy

I went around dizzy and distracted

I can read and I can write

Day and night I am in anticipation

No joy, my heart knows no joy

Mücrimi says, my eye, my tear

My mind is not free from grief

Stones rain upon me from tyrants

No joy, my heart knows no joy

—————————————————————————

Text from Ulaş Özdemir Şu diyârı- gurbet elde: Âşık Mücrimî’nin yaşamı ve şiirleri (Pan, 2007)

Şu diyâr-ı gurbet elde

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Kimse bilmez ahvâlimden

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Ben sinemi yaktım nâra

Gönül düşmüştür efkâra

Teccellî mi baht mı kara

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Ağlamışım güldür yâ Rabb

Düşkününüm kaldır yâ Rabb

Hâlim sana ayan yâ Rabb

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Ser-gerdân olmuş gezerim

Hem okuyup hem yazarım

Gece gündüz intizârım

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Mücrimî der dîdem yaşım

Gamdan ayrılmıyor başım

Adûlardan değer taşım

Şen değil gönlüm şen değil

Muhlis Akarsu ‘Gurbeti ben mi yarattım’

25 Friday Mar 2011

Posted by koerbin in Translations

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Arif Sağ, gurbet, koşma, mahlas, Muhabbet, Muhlis Akarsu, Musa Eroğlu, semai

Galata Bridge, Istanbul, 1999

When Arif Sağ re-emerged as a recording artist in the early 1980s having given away his arabesk career in the mid-1970s and worked as a teacher at the İstanbul Devlet Türk Müziği Konservatuarı, he released a cassette album called Gurbeti ben mi yarattım. The title song was from the Kangal aşık Muhlis Akarsu. Sağ’s recording is intimate and almost reticent – very striking in a restrained way. Oddly the cover of the cassette that I obtained in Urfa in 1987 (which I believe is the original 1981 release) has a photograph of Sağ (see photo below) that harks back to his arabesk days, dressed in yellow zip up blazer, slicked down hair and pencil moustache – totally belying the intimate sound of voice and bağlama on the recording. This would be the recording that began Sağ’s stylistic hegemony over the performance of Alevi music in the 1980s and 1990s. The iconography was yet to catch up.

sag_gurbeti_ben

Sağ recorded the deyiş again for the second of the Muhabbet series of recordings two or three years later. Muhabbet 2 is arguably the finest of the series in terms of its thematic strength which centres around the concept of gurbet – absence from one’s native place or home. Gurbeti ben mi yarattım is the final song on that recording although only three of the four verses are sung (the second is ommited) with Sağ, Musa Eroğlu and Muhlis Akarsu taking turns on the verses – a quite unusual approach for the Muhabbet series. Akarsu of course recorded the song but sadly, although a number of his recordings have been issued on CD, that one has not. However a recording of Akarsu performing it live is available on YouTube.

Gurbet is obviously the theme of the deyiş and this is deepened to almost ‘starkly bleak’ – thanks Tom Rapp! – realms with the addition of the theme of yokluk – which refers to absence, even to the degree of non-existance (it also has a meaning of poverty). I don’t think I’ve captured the full sense of yokluk so that will require working on. Another word to mention is sıla in the mahlas line which I have rendered as ‘returning’ but it really means return to family, friends and one’s native place – the opposite really of gurbet. A good translation here for imkân also rather eludes me. Having tried ‘possibilities’ it sounded too lumpen and ‘practicalities’ would be even worse. For the moment ‘chances’ it is. The deyiş is in the short koşma form (semai) with only 8 syllables per line which gives it a simple directness; but it is constructed with typical economy and finesse.

Muhlis Akarsu: Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Translation: Paul Koerbin

Destitution has compelled me

Was it I who created the exile?

It came and took my youth

Was it I who created the exile?

I received neither letter nor news

Parted from my country and home

I felt the loss of all that was mine

Was it I who created the exile?

Evening comes and the shadow settles

Winds blow against my hope

Absence constrains my chances

Was it I who created the exile?

Akarsu, don’t think about returning

Don’t believe this isolation has passed

How I fell upon helplessness

Was it I who created the exile?

————————————————————————————

Turkish text from Muhlis Akarsu: yaşamı, sanatı, şiirleri ve dünya görüşü by Süleyman Zaman, 2006.

Yokluk beni mecbur etti

Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Gençliğimi aldı gitti

Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Ne mektup ne haber aldım

Yurdumdan yuvamdan oldum

Her şeyime hasret kaldım

Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Akşam olur gölge basar

Umuduma yeller eser

Yokluk imkânımı keser

Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Akarsu sılayı anma

Bu ayrılık geçti sanma

Çaresizdim geldim amma

Gurbeti ben mi yarattım

Aşık Veysel ‘Beni hor görme kardaşım’

29 Monday Nov 2010

Posted by koerbin in Translations

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Arif Sağ, Aşık Veysel, mahlas, Muhlis Akarsu

Aşık Veysel Şatıroğlu (1894-1973) was born in Sivrialan near Şarkışla in the Sivas region, was and is the most renowned and generally loved of all 20th century Turkish aşık-s. His identity is strongly associated with Republican Turkey and indeed there is a statue of him in pride of place near the entrance of Gülhane park in Istanbul. His songs have a strong philosophical and humanistic character and he tended to avoid a strong (and hence political) expression of his Alevi identity, although of course it is evident in his songs. The finest recordings available are the field recordings made by Alain Gheerbrant in 1957 in which Veysel played more naturally to his Alevi identity. Gheerbrant, out of consideration for Veysel did not publish the recordings until after the aşık’s death. They are available on the Radio France Ocora double ablbum published in 1985 (558634/35) from which the photograph here is taken.

Muhlis Akarsu recorded Beni hor görme on his recording titled “… gönül” although, interestingly, with Veysel’s mahlas replaced by the word “insan” (human) and the order of verses changed with the mahlas verse sung as the second of three verses. Arif Sağ also recorded a similar version on his 1981 recording Gürbeti ben mi yarattım with the mahlas verse back in place but, like Akarsu, with “insan” replacing Veysel’s mahlas. Sağ over a decade later produced what remains Nuray Hafiftaş’s finest recording, Şimdi oldu, which also includes the song, but with the Veysel’s mahlas restored.

Translation challenges include getting a workable reading of the form of the refrain line with it’s half question and answer. It implies a conditional sentence although it does not use that construction. One writer, the wonderfully named Azeri scholar Sednik Paşeyevi Pirsultanlı, does in fact read the line in this way, e.g. “sen yolcuysan ben baç mıyım?”. I have tried a slightly different more direct approach. The second line in the penultimate verse also provides a challenge to convey in a line a satisfactory sense of the original. It refers to the concept of the true spirit or soul of person not being able to ascend to a higher level until the carnal and worldly desires and self (nefs) are done away with.

Aşık Veysel: Beni hor görme

Translation: Paul Koerbin

Don’t look down on me, my brother

You are gold – so am I then bronze?

We are of the same existence

You are silver – so am I then thin metal?

Whatever exists is in you and in me

The same existence in every body

That tomorrow is headed for the grave

You are full – so am I then empty?

Some are mullahs, some dervish

God, it seems, gave to us whatever

Some might talk of the bee and the flower

You are honey – so am I than a heap of grain?

All of our bodies come from the earth

Kill off the carnal self before the dying

So the creator seems to have commanded

You are the pen – so am I then the nib?

Veysel is disposed to be a lover

We are brothers made out of the earth

We are the same as fellow travellers

You are the traveller – so am I then the toll?

—————————————————————————————

Original text from recording by Aşık Veysel on the CD Aşık Veysel Klasikleri

Ben hor görme kardeşim

Sen altınsın ben tunç muyum

Aynı vardan var olmuşuz

Sen gümüşsün ben saç mıyım

Ne var ise sende bende

Aynı varlık her bendende

Yarın mezara girende

Sen toksun da ben aç mıyım

Kimi molla kimi derviş

Allah bize neler vermiş

Kimi arı çiçek dermiş

Sen balsın da ben cec miyim

Topraktandır cümle beden

Nefsini öldür ölmeden

Böyle emretmiş yaradan

Sen kalemsin ben uç muyum

Tabiata Veysel âşık

Topraktan olduk kardaşık

Aynı yolcuyuz yoldaşık

Sen yolcusun ben bac mıyım

Pir Sultan Abdal ‘Gel seninle ahd ü peyman edelim’ (‘Ne sen beni unut ne de ben seni’)

14 Thursday Oct 2010

Posted by koerbin in Translations

≈ 1 Comment

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Arif Sağ, Cahit Öztelli, mahlas, Tacim Dede, İbrahim Aslanoğlu

The text here is from Cahit Öztelli’s 1971 collection which, to the best of my knowledge, is its first publication. Some of the language suggests its been around for some time so it is curious that it slipped through the efforts of Ergun, Atalay and Gölpınarlı and Boratav. Part of its attraction is surely in the wonderful refrain. My translation of this line remains very clumsy compared with the Turkish – needs some inspiration.

Arif Sağ recorded a version of this deyiş collected from the great Sinemilli (Maraş) dede and deyiş source Tacim Dede (sometimes Tacım) on Sağ’s most eccentric recording Biz İnsanlar / Kerbela from 1990. The album includes odd programmed ‘casio’ like rhythms and synthesised instrument colours and sounds. It remains the Arif Sağ recording that I listen to most perhaps. The arrangement of this song in particular is peculiar in that the last verse changes melody, rhythm and tempo to that of the song that follows it, another Pir Sultan song İnsan olan nura çevrilir collected from İsmail Özden. While this is clearly one of the more striking arrangements on a strange album, Zafer Gündoğdu does a redux of the arrangement for his recording of the song on his 2002 recording Bahçe biziz gül bizdedi. The main differences in the Tacim Dede version are in verse 4 (very different) and verse 3 (somewhat different) with some other changes in the other verses that present a slightly simpler lyric but not a change in the substance of meaning. For example ‘iman’ instead of ‘peyman’ in the opening line and ‘İrfan meclisine vardığın zaman ‘ as the third line of the second verse. There are a number of other variations. As with many Pir Sultan deyiş from this region the mahlas form is Abdal Pir Sultan’ım which is just one of the pieces of evidence that raises questions about İbrahim Aslanoğlu’s conclusions in regards to the six putative Pir Sultan Abdallar.

Pir Sultan Abdal: Gel seninle ahd ü peyman edelim

Translation: Paul Koerbin

Come and let us make a pledge with you

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

Let the two of us cherish a vow

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

For mercy, how her eyebrows are finely wrought

We pursued pleasure, we did so without end

When I was among the cultured crowd

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

I am inclined towards the saz and conversation

I am inclined towards you and prosperity

By your love I fell out upon the foreign land

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

My beloved’s beauty like the moon and sun

Does your lover not draw forth his moan?

Bring forth and let us imbibe the word of God

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

They drew Abdal Pir Sultan to the gallows place

I fell down for your love and suffer for you

Behold there erenler that one going to the beloved

Neither you forget me, nor I forget you

——————————————————————————————–

Original text from: Cahit Öztelli Pir Sultan Abdal : Bütün Şiirleri, 1971

Gel seninle ahd-ü peyman edelim

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

İkimiz de bir ikrarı güdelim

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

Aman kaşı keman elinde aman

Sürdük safasını, etmedik tamam

Ehl-i irfan içre olduğum zaman

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

Hem saza mailem hem de sohbete

Hem sana mailem hem de devlete

Aşkın ile düştüm diyar gurbete

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

Yârimin cemâli güneşle mâhı

Sana âşık olan çekmez mi âhı

Getir and içelim Kelâmullahı

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

Abdal Pir Sultan’ı çektiler dâra

Düşmüşüm aşkına yanarım nâra

Bakın hey erenler şu giden yâra

Ne sen beni unut, ne de ben seni

Kul Himmet ‘Allah bir Muhammed Ali diyerek’ (Düaz-ı imam)

23 Sunday May 2010

Posted by koerbin in Translations

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Arif Sağ, Cahit Öztelli, Düaz-ı imam, Kul Himmet, Shahrbanu, Tolga Sağ, Translation, Şehriban

While working on a chapter of my PhD devoted to identity issues concerning Kul Himmet and Kul Himmet Üstadım for the thesis it seemed a good time to introduce Kul Himmet to the blog. Kul Himmet ranks with Şah Hatayi and Pir Sultan as the third in the triumvirate of great lyric and didactic Alevi poets. Even less about Kul Himmet is known than of Pir Sultan and certainly Hatayi (Shah Ismail). We do generally understand from the internal evidence of the deyişler that Kul Himmet was the murid (disciple) of Pir Sultan and provides the connection to another great aşık of Alevi ritual culture, Kul Hüseyin; also that he was educated. I will leave the issue of Kul Himmet Üstadım for another day.

This düaz-ı imam is another favourite of Alevi expressive culture. In performance it is sung to a powerful and deeply mysterious melody, somewhat unusually for Alevi music using a garip tetrachord for the lower part of the melody; although this modulates to the hüseyni ayağı for the third, sixth and ninth verses. The tune can be heard in the opening of the unbearably tragic film Journey of Hope.

The main difficulties in translation arise from names and some specific Alevi concepts that are reluctantly translated. For example, what to do with ‘erenler‘? My instinct is to leave as Erens, but I try a translation of ‘enlightened‘. A good translation for ‘vird‘ continues to elude. I have succombed to ‘prayer’ but not happily. This düaz goes beyond the twelve imams and brings in other identities such as Kanber, Salman and Fatma and the especially interesting Bibi Shahrbanu (Şehriban). Will perhaps add some explanation later.

Interestingly the earliest printed version of this text in Besim Atalay’s Bektaşilik ve Edebiyat (1924; republished in modern Turkish translation by Vedat Atila in 1991) does not take the form of a düaz-ı imam and does not include reference to the twelve imams though it does retain the references to Fatma, Şehriban and İmam Hüseyin. The text translated here is from Cahit Öztelli’s Pir Sultan’ın Dostları (2nd ed 1996) with one change to the order of the verses. The verse beginning “İmam Zeynel paralandı, bölündü” appears in Öztelli as the second last verse. Following the recordings by Arif and Tolga Sağ I have moved this to the fifth verse where it makes more sense logically and chronologically in respect to the invocation of the imams.

Kul Himmet ‘Ali bir Muhammed Ali diyerek’ (Düaz-ı imam)

Translation: Paul Koerbin

Every morning the birds sound together

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The nightingale begins a lament for the rose

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Our fate shall turn upon the direction we face

Veysel Karani went to the land of Yemen

We are bees and we fly off for almighty manna

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Let us endure mourning for the Imams

Hear the true voice of the enlightened

Imam Hasan drank the poisoned challice

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The one who seeks is sifted through a fine mesh

The one who believes turns to the True way

Shah Hüseyin was soaked in scarlet blood

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Imam Zeynel was torn to pieces and portioned

Humble respect was given to the Imam Bakir

The essence of direction was given to Cafer-i Sadık

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

The heart is a bird’s ramshackle nest

The Shah’s desire become our prayers

The prayer of Kâzım, Musa, Ali Rıza

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Shah Taki and Naki went on as light

Hasan-ül Askerî went on as the brave

The Mehdi went on mysterious in the cave

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Kanber, Salman, Fatma stood for the prayer

Shahrbanu was stripped and mounted on the camel

Jesus was distressed and passed unto the air

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

Four books were written and passed to four faiths

The Kuran became Muhammed’s prayers

Kul Himmet passed to the sorrow of his saint

Saying Allah is one, Muhammad, Ali

—————————————————————————-

Original text from Cahit Öztelli Pir Sultan’ın Dostları (2nd ed. 1996)

Her sabah her sabah ötüşür kuşlar