An eleven-year-old boy, whose name we do not know, runs away from an orphanage and returns to his birthplace, where his peers call him “Kundel” and his alcoholic mother has no intention of welcoming him home. So he takes refuge on an abandoned raft moored in front of a well-to-do family's home. A girl of his age lives there and becomes his only friend. The boy survives by finding and selling scrap metal and has to be careful to stay away from a gang of gluesniffing kids. He dreams of becoming a poet.
