We hear a whole catalogue of technical, moral, and financial instructions, ranging from practical to absurd, each introduced by “It works . . . ,” as in “It works in the shops and in all of the malls; it works when you cut off your microscopic balls. . . . It works if you heat up the nickel, if you save up the dime, and on a blackballer I wasted my prime. . . However, a single glance at the homeless protagonist and his forlorn setting suffices to clarify that none of this advice has worked all that well for him.
