As the sun sets, Lee Doucette flips over a plastic bucket and slides it to the edge of a wall that overlooks the Merrimack River. Shadows of tall weeds, and a tent — where she’s lived since March — fall on the woman, who sits on the pail and methodically tears slices of bread into smaller and smaller pieces before tossing them to the waiting geese below.

“These are some of my friends,” she says, nodding to the birds below. “I got no family. All the people I know are homeless.”