His Father Had Not Been An English Man, But The Son Speaks He Tongue-Twister's English, A Walking Dictionary Not, But A Phonetician Poem by Bijay Kant Dubey

His father had not been an Englishman,
Born in India,
One from Asia,
But he,
What to say about him
And his alien tongue,
Going with a click?

His father had not been an Englishman,
But he thinks of out and out an Englishman
Speaking British English,
American English,
Canadian English,
Caribbean English
Just like a stormy bowling session or commentary.

And even if is not, will become so
After learning English,
Reading in Eng. Hons. and M.A. in Eng. Lit. not,
Phonetics and linguistics, a village boy
Working in a call centre,
Living in a cab,
Announcing and advertizing.

Like a DJ, disco jockey of an FM Radio Station
Speaking Benglish, Bengali plus English,
Hinglish, Hindi plus English
Stylistically
In a foreign tone of his own,
Spicing and salting the things.

Like a humorist or a satirist in mocking,
An Englishman born in India
To English parents
On sojourn not,
But an Indian
Not from London,
But from India, Dilli

Is he the speaker, an earnest learner of it,
Wanting to be an interpreter,
A guide to
The foreigners on their visit to India,
The tourists from across the sea,
Seas not only,
But from India too

Which like a sub-continent of different
Native tongues and speakers,
The speakers of Hindi
Failing to converse with the Bengalis
And even a Hindi-speaker a little bit of Bengali,
The southern ones almost unintelligible
And what more to say about the tribal languages?

A tongue-twister's English, he will
Walking on tip-toe,
Strutting and walking
And showing,
Going after the English,
Trying to imitate like
Gandhi in suit and boots, tie and coat.

A teacher of phonetics and linguistics
He is going to be appointed
To teach the students in foreign,
Like Yemen or Jordan
To make a tryst with it,
An Indian
Even speaking Hindi in an English tone.

Thank you, sir, I am going,
What trouble is it in thinking oneself
A foreigner
Speaking impeccable English
If I can't go to England or America
As many of the bogus too
Have availed of the fellowship programs?
How did you like the poem?