On the dry scorcher of a Sunday afternoon, I came across Aslan near
Udyog Bhawan Metro Station.
Dusty July roads were yet to be dampened by the scanty rains that
the Capital earned and stray leaves flitted around in an occasional dry breeze.
Metro and its surroundings were devoid of commuters with all
offices closed shut. Green sentry boxes by bungalow gates were empty, their dopey occupants
lying in front of the whizzing large coolers inside. Monkeys dozed away on the trees, waiting for
the sun to go down.
Standing outside the metro waiting for a rickshaw on that desolate day,
I found him walking across with none of the grace that his picture in my mind
carried. Apart from that, he was still the same Aslan, huge with the gilded
skin.
“Afternoon,” he said with a frigid sadness, the voice still sinewy. “I
wish it had been a good one,” he added and licked few tiny blobs of blood on his
legs. “Dogs...” he paused and continued after
cleaning the bare wounds for a while that looked like ugly tattoo patches on
his perfect skin, “those infernal street dogs.”
He curled himself down on the exit of the Metro where the excess treated
cold air from down below bunked out. When the silence started getting a bit
awkward, I asked, “Don’t they get scared?” He looked at me for a while and
replied, “No. They probably think I’m a plump calf.” Raising himself up, he said, maybe to himself, “got to leave before the monkeys get down”.
He walked away in the evening sun, the leaves and the dust.
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Image courtesy: www.randyelrod.com
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