"The Boy in the Bubble" discusses starvation and terrorism, but mixes this with wit and optimism. Simon concurred with this assessment: "Hope and dread—that's right. That's the way I see the world, a balance between the two, but coming down on the side of hope." The song retains a variation of the only lyric Simon composed on his South African trip: "The way the camera follows him in slo-mo, the way he smiled at us all." The imagery was inspired by the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan. "Homeless" discusses poverty within the black majority in South Africa. According to Simon's ex-wife Carrie Fisher, the "Graceland" lines "She's come back to tell me she's gone / As if I didn't know that, as if I didn't know my own bed / As if I'd never noticed the way she brushed her hair from her forehead" refer to her. She confirmed she had a habit of brushing her hair from her forehead, and said she felt privileged to be in one of Simon's songs.