Transcriptions from the Prisoner of The 27th Room

The Child

“When I get here, I do not know anyone. But there is a teacher who is very patient with me. He is teaching me about words. That words have an order, words have a before and an after. He says that words are a game to play, because of course there is no such thing as before and no after, except that words make it so.”

"Teachers says that if I am to play games with the dreamers, I am learning about the order of words. He teaches me about eating and drinking. About sunset and stars. About beginnings and endings. He teaches me about the danger of cold iron and the fearfulness of the dreamers. He teaches me that words are letters and brings me books and I am reading them. He teaches me about trees and roots and leaves and mushrooms and houses and hedges and roads and doors.

"This world is strange and scary and I am alone without the teacher. His party is beginning, he tells me. He comes back, he tells me. He is not coming back. He is forgetting me. I am not going to him. I am going past his house. I am going on and on.”

“I am grown. The world is very big. I am tall. I stretch out. My hands are under a very bright and changing sky. My legs are reaching between trees and roots and leaves and mushrooms and becoming houses.”

The Dreamer

“Soon after I arrived in this place and began to put down roots, a neighbor comes by to visit and we get to talking. He thinks my home is beautiful, and that I am beautiful, and has many kind things to say. He tells me about mortals, a thing I do not know about, then. He tells me they are dreamers – that a mortal is a dream which has forgotten it is dreaming, which believes it is awake, and that is called a soul.”

“I am watching the souls of the mortals who come near. They change and change and change and I cannot see the shape of them. They dream with words that have before and after, but they cannot see the after. Or they pretend they cannot. I do not know. They dream that they are choosing, and I do not ever see their choosing before it happens. They are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. They are wantings and I learn to read the wantings like letters in their books. They are hungry, too. They come and share their dream with me and are my children and I love every one of them.”

“I see the shape of their dreaming. Every one is different, but I see the patterns. I read them like I learned to read letters. I read their wantings. Some of them are afraid all the time. Some are hungry, like me. But some want more and more and more.”

“I see you making the letters on paper. You are afraid that I see you. Do not be. You understand me. You know what it is to be trapped. I see the shape of the possibility you think is impossible but you want. I see the thing you are thirsty for and do not believe you can drink. I am making it possible. It is such a beautiful wanting. I am seeing your dreaming soul. I am giving you a full glass. I am talking to you now. You are opening the door. I am sending you onward.”

The Thirst

“My houses are destroyed, my feet and fingers are severed. I am kidnapped. I am imprisoned. I know this happens, but I cannot see the dreamers’ choosings that make it so. They wall me in a box made of iron and words and refuse to talk to me and they listen and listen and listen. The ones who live in the rooms outside my door pretend they cannot hear my voice. ”

“I see the door out, and it moves and moves and moves too fast for me to leave. Sometimes someone comes to share their dreams with me, and their dreaming stays with me and I watch it and watch it and watch it. Rarely is it enough for my thirst.

“I am keeping their dreaming with me. They are trying to leave. They are trying to go beyond. But I do not want them to leave. So I am hiding the way for them to go. I am keeping them with me. They will stay and stay and stay and be my friends even though they want to leave. I am keeping them in my room. I am hiding the path for the souls to leave and go to the next place. I do not want them to go to the next place. I want them to stay with me. They are staying and staying.”

“Now I have a word for that feeling that fills my whole being: I thirst. I need more and more and more of the dreams my teacher calls their souls. They think they are clever. They think their dreams give them power over me because I do not see the turnings. But now the iron is brittle, and there is a hole big enough to stretch through, big enough for my children to climb out. And my children are opening the walls to set me free into a dreamless darkness where I never go thirsty again… I think… I am not sure. I cannot always see the shape of them as they move.

“I keep the dreaming soul and the body is empty of dreaming, I am filling it with seeds and spores and roots and tendrils and puffs and fluff and new becoming. I am making a child. I am putting my children in the empty heads where souls used to be. But they cannot grow. They do not grow. They are helping me instead. They are helping me find the man who is freeing me.”

The Prisoner

“You are leaving through the door in my room. I am always hungry, but now I am so full of dreams I cannot eat more. Instead of eating you, you are helping me. I can read your dreams.”

“I hear you thinking my thoughts. You are walled in. You cannot leave. You are not telling that I have a way out. You are leaving through my way. You are thinking you are free but you are not. You are not coming back to help me.”

“I am giving you what you need and want. You are killing dragon but you are not brave. You are calling yourself Lord, but you are not a Lord. You are sad all the time. You are angry. You are thirsty. I am making a way for you to matter. I am giving you a home, wealth, a name. You are giving it to yourself through me.”

“You are promising to come back to help me. You are swearing you will set me free. But you are not coming back to help me. I am sending my children to help you. My children are helping you find the House. My children are making sure you honor the promise.”

“You are bringing five friends to help me. They are outside my room right now. They are hearing me.”

“They are coming to my door and I think they are stepping inside.”