Poetry 2019 Longlist, Pitambar Naik

The Phonetics of My Boyhood

Mother taught me the phonetics of hexagonal topology 

and the prosody of serene phoneme

with the pulse of sensibility

she made me memorise the tables 

of a banyan tree’s innocence oftentimes 

promising a reward for every answer

she helped me practice the formulae 

asking to surf the galaxy of truth alongside 

even pain might be your apple-red beloved

of your heart, she reiterated. 

I accompanied her to the park and cinema;

like a ghost in her sari drape or a shadow in precision

of course I wasn’t a boy with boy IQ 

she drove as usual very grave to reprimand

some of the gods of small things 

in the market she would sip a cup of cinnamon tea    

with Udupi uttapam; when I said that I loved the Lee brand 

and Reebok’s tawdriness

mother would gift just a cowboy’s hat

and a pair of South Korean T-shirts

or hardly some mediocre goggles 

the Nivia store always remained an illusion.

Mother was obviously not poor at mathematics

but exceptionally good

even at the theory of diminishing marginal utility

she fumigated the seeds of economic conundrums

coinciding the art of pole-vaulting 

and the nuances of Newton’s formulae with it.

Often she chased me to dare skydiving like eagles

and snow surfing like penguins 

she sounded the phonetics—pain might either be the replica

of Abraham Lincoln’s laughter

or an antique love letter of Cleopatra

otherwise the joy of Uncle Tom’s redemption!

Pitambar Naik is an Indian poet and writer. He was shortlisted for the Wordweavers India Poetry Contest 2017 and longlisted for the Rhythm Divine Poetry Chapbook Contest 2018. His work has appeared in Vayavya, Literary Orphans, Occulum, Ethos Literary Journal, Joao-Roque Literary Journal, The Mark Literary Review, Blue Lake Review, Mojave Heart Review, Selcouth Station, Moonchild Magazine, Bhashabandhan Literary Review, HEArt Online, Formercactus, Coldnoon International, Spark Magazine, The Wagon Magazine, The Hans India, The New Indian Express, Better Than Starbucks, Kitaab International, Muse India, Best Indian Poetry and elsewhere and is forthcoming in The Literary Nest.