At least intact

At the station I heard them arguing about whether the man was homeless. Who else knits a narrow scarf with baby blue wool over a Coles green bag as he walks, she was saying, than someone who is clearly mad and probably homeless? You have to look at the shoes, the other was saying. He has trodden the ends of his pants but his shoes look new -- cheap but new -- or not entirely new, she then conceded: at least intact.

In Africa

In Africa, he said, he didn’t have to wonder what to do with paper in the way he had to wonder what to do with it here – carrying it around in his bag, mostly – sometimes his mother carrying it – they all were carrying it – sometimes one of them carried the paper that the other person needed but couldn’t get until that person returned; he had missed appointments because the paper he needed was in somebody else’s bag; in Africa, he said, if anyone had paper, you took it and sold it for food.