In the kitchen, Lassana has finished chopping up the chili peppers and onions and is frying them in oil. Powerful fumes. All doors and windows open.

Down at the Sunday market among the shoppers, two groups of people: the ultra right-wingers, holding court a few paces away from the so-called Socialists doing the same. I avoided both. At the heart of the so-called Socialist circle, the woman who used to go out of her way to smile, say hello and ask if there was anything – anything at all – she could do for me. For me, no, I answered one day. But for a family here in this town, yes, you could make a huge difference. After being on her case three times and having someone else follow up some more, she pretended not to see me today, so I ignored her.

As  one of my characters would say : « Fuck it. »

I stood in line at one of the stalls instead, and scribbled out some words on a scrap of paper. Thinking of this woman, and others like her, I wrote:

Cognoscenti

They’ve read it all

They hang out with the right people

What they don’t know isn’t worth

Knowing

Their boredom has no bounds

« Surprise me, » they order

and spit you out before swallowing

they’ve read all this before

 

Except they haven’t.

***

Sunday. Chili peppers and onions frying in oil. Windows open. Powerful fumes.