Mehdigulu Khan Vafa


Mehdigulu Khan Khasay Khan oglu Utsmiyev was a lyrical poet of Azerbaijan, a lieutenant colonel in the Russian Army, and the son of the Karabakh poet Khurshidbanu Natavan.

Life

Mehdigulu was born in 1855 in Shusha in the family of a major-general, Khasay Khan Utsmiyev. In 1859, Alexandre Dumas wrote about him: "a five- or six-year-old boy probably instinctively holding a dagger... This was a really sharp dagger, which a French mother would never give to her child."
He served in the Russian Army and became a lieutenant colonel. He married Saltanatbeyim Karim qizi Jevanshir and had four children: a son Khasay, and three daughters: Agabike, Bilgeysbike and Azizabike. He wrote with the name "Vafa", what means loyal.
He died in 1900 in Tiflis.

Lyrics

Some of his lyrics he wrote also in Persian:

...کی باشد آنکه بخت سیه باز من شود

تا توتیای دیده کنم خاک کربلا

یارب مباد آنکه کنم خاک کربلا

دست وفا ز دامن اولاد مرتضی...

Khurshidbanu Natavan about him

Mehdigulu's mother Khurshidbanu Natavan missed him, and wrote a poem saying that she is ready to give her life in order to see him:

Varımdı sinədə dərdü qəmi-nəhan, ölürəm,

Fəda olum sənə, gəl eylə imtəhan, ölürəm.



Fəraqdan gecələr yatmaram səbahə kimi,

Xəyali – zülfünə bağlı gedibdir can, ölürəm.



Çəkirdim həsrətini, görmədim, xudahafiz!

Olubdur indi işim naləvü fəğan, ölürəm.