Country hits from Cowboy ’Al

Being rejected in love was not doing PMji any good. It’s not as if he wasn’t trying. He had invested in a 10-gallon hat and proper steel-spurred leather boots. He had instructed his aides to call him ’Al, instead of Atal, and he now responded to their namaskars with a breezy ‘Hi’, as he chewed gum and slunk cowboy-style into his office at Race Course Road. But it didn’t seem to work. Georgina Bush, his one love, barely spared a glance in his direction. ‘‘Use me, love me,’’ was the last desperate missive he had e-mailed to the White House some 12 days ago. The reply, when it came, was so ambiguous that it broke his heart. Last week, evidence emerged that the lady was doing a little hanky-panky on the side and courting that old scoundrel, P. Mush — also known as Pure Mush — across the neighbourhood fence. Two nights ago, he had caught them whispering sweet nothings to each other. ‘‘O Georgina, you are so cruel,’’ he whispered to no one is particular. So overcome was he by grief that he reached for his guitar and took to crooning country hits to the moon...

Yellow Rose of Texas
There’s a yellow rose in Texas,
I’m longin’ for that nexus,
No one else can help her, you see,
Not half as much as me, as me.
I cried so much when she departed,
I’d never guessed she’s so hard-hearted,
And if I ever find her,
We never more will part.
She’s the sweetest little rosebud,
That Texas ever knew,
Her eyes are bright as a hundred suns,
They sparkle like the fire of guns.
You may talk about V. Putin,
And sing of Clinton B.
But the yellow rose of Texas,
Is the only girl for me.
Oh Georgina...
I came from New Delly wid a banjo on my new knee,
I’m goin’ to Louisiana, my true love for to see,
It rained all night the day you left, the weather it was dry,
The sun so hot I froze to death, Georgina don’t you cry.
O Georgina, oh don’t you cry for me,
I’ve come from New Delly, wid a banjo on my new knee.
I had a dream the other night, when everything was still,
I thought I saw Georgina, a-coming from over the hill,
In her jet-planes and B52 bombers, and her rat-a-tat-tat-tat,
I thought I was by her side as she bombed Afghanistan flat.
O Georgina, oh don’t you cry for me,
I’ve come from New Delly, wid a banjo on my new knee.

By now, large sobs found their way through our cowboy’s breast. Pure Mush had just gone on TV to announce his ‘‘special and intimate relationship’’ with Georgina. He had promised — he revealed to the world — to allow her to walk all over him with her steel-tipped stilettos and had vowed to carry her footwear and even lick them every once in a while. ‘‘Treachery!’’ cried Cowboy ’Al, to no one in particular. ‘‘O Georgina, Georgina, I could have done it so much better.’’

He then sang a lonely number quietly to himself...

Walk with me
Walk with me through the long and lonely night,
Walk with me and my world is filled with light.
Here I stand feeling lost and so alone,
Take my hand, don’t desert me now, please don’t hurt me now...

It was at this juncture that he broke down, the last note reverberating in the night air like a forgotten dream.

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