A thing of shreds and patches

The lady in the park. I have followed her with sympathetic eyes for some two years now and noted sadly how she becomes ever more ragged and careless about her appearance. When first I saw her, she was a happy creature, beautiful in her turban and colourful, draped clothes. Now her lipstick is smeared all around her mouth and her clothes have taken on a general brownish hue.

We have spoken several times and I have often asked if I could photograph her – I do have one shot of her in happier times. Recently, though, she has always said ‘’no’, so I feel bad about snapping her while she slept, oblivious to the market traffic around her. She recognizes me and calls out (she calls me ‘chérie’, so at first I thought she might hail from a French-speaking country - but the pronunciation is Brazilian, or at any rate, not French). Even at the beginning, her conversation was a series of disconnected phrases. After a few words, she would smile and drift off. A mystery.

I read a while back about a Japanese man who became famous as the world’s most elegant beggar (or street-dweller). He had lost his job in the big city and preferred to live rough rather than return to his family in shame and with no money. I should have liked to put my friend here on record as the world’s most elegant and beautiful female street-dweller (I have never seen her beg), but alas, those days have gone. Her time on the streets has taken a heavy toll.

My contribution to Chantler63's December challenge (Brown)