~* A sight of plight! *~

A busy street, bustling with sounds of horns from vehicles - small to big, zooming past the petty shops stacked on the sides. Alongside the road...almost invisible to the fast moving people, a black sintex tank sits on the the pavement. Making it hard to say it's truly black, many layers of posters are stuck on it..newly released movies..heroine's head cut..hero's face torn, hardly one can make out the movie's name. Next to this tank.. a few meters away.. an electric box, locked and painted with a danger sign on it. As if ironically, there's an innocent looking young boy, sitting on the stone slab that bases the box.

He should be around 13-14 years of age, but seems younger than that as he surprises the passer-bys with his child-like gestures and behavior. Dressed in only a pair of 'Khaki' colored trousers, mixed with the dust and dirt, displaying different shades of brown. Torn on the sides, mistaken for pockets, the only piece of clothing that seems to be his cover. His bare chest, patted lavishly with the ' Powder of the Poor', that's to say the mud and the soil. He doesn't give a pleasing sight.. maybe that's why no one notices this loner! Sitting day and night in the same place, hardly visible to the hurrying people on the roads.

He sits on the bench, one leg carelessly hanging and the other placed upright, knees bent on the bench. Looking up into the vast blue sky, chanting a 'prayer' like something in a language only he seems to understand. Not steady for a minute, his eyes glistening with unconscious tears, move so fast like a black coin on a carom board. He then shifts his attention back to the roads, points his finger at someone...anyone...or actually no one and starts talking to 'them'. He has no regret, no embarrassment in gaining incredible momentary attention as he jumps up from his almost statued position, to stand on the middle of the pavement, startling the pedestrians with shock. Unmindful of being a hindrance to these mundane masses' way, he goes round and round and round on his weak legs, now shaking.. predicting a fall anytime. Dizzy now, he sits back on the bench, resuming another position, now almost still, only to fool yet another set of unaware people who walk past him. He sits there in silence, a firm gaze on the speeding vehicles, his eyes imitating a slow pendulum, his lips slightly parted to reveal a set of crooked teeth… lips swollen making it a little hard to remain closed, his hands perched on his bruised knees, occasionally rubbing the non-existent itch on his face.
No one dares to interfere, as he is lost completely in his own world, a solitude so precious, a language only familiar to him, innocently fighting a battle to live, carelessly living in this care forgotten world, a soldier in his own terms, fighting an almost dying battle, this boy is a Survivor...but a prisoner of his sickness!!