he sits and pulls out his razor,
rummages through a gunnysack,
papers, photos of his children in
another country
With this description the narrator is explaining that his father keeps all of his worldly possessions in one bag, his gunnysack. He also tells the reader what these possessions are; they are not just possessions, like his razor, for example.T hey are also memories in object form. He carries pictures of his family, both his parents and his children, and this shows that although they are all separated, they are still very important to each other and share a deep bond.
The lines also show that the narrator is aware that he is important to his father, because his photograph is with him at all times. It is as though his father looks at the photographs in the morning after praying, to reaffirm his commitment to the day and to reconfirm to himself why he is working so hard, living away from his family.
My father lights the kerosene
lamp, his beard bitten
This simple description of his father's actions and his appearance speak volumes about the way in which he lives, and the conditions where he lives as well. He lights a kerosene lamp both to light the area around him and to try to repel the mosquitoes that are relentless in their attack. His beard is bitten which indicates that try as he might, he is no match for the bugs that continue to plague him. The terrain is hard and his life is hard too, and the narrator is aware that these experiences have shaped his father into the man that he himself came to know.
