Since last summer, I’ve been collecting snatches of conversations that I overhear. On the street. At coffee shops. At the Waffle House.

Last week, I had a chance to make use of some of those. The theme at the regular reading at the Liminal alternative artspace in Roanoke was “found texts.” The idea was for readers to take things not meant as art and turn them into art. Some used old letters. I used 24 lines I had overheard in downtown Roanoke.

Borrowing a technique from the world of comedy improv, I cut them into 24 pieces of paper, put them in a box and then had two people — Ashley Meador and Katerina Yancey — pull out lines and create a dialogue with them.

Here’s the result.