Theater Room

I can sit on this side of the table and look out the window, or I can sit on the other side and watch the room. Every time I look at this picture, I mistakenly imagine there’s a mirror in front of me. How is it that the curtain behind me is reflected in the mirror like this? And how is the house behind me reflected as well? Where is this dreamlike room? Then I realize my imagination has gone ahead of my eyes. When I look again with my eyes, I see that these pleated curtains have created a theater that, at the end, seems to either rise aside or above to reveal reality; when the curtain rises, a house—perhaps just like this one—and rooms with closed windows come into view. I find nothing else; the lace curtain blocks my view, and how fortunate that this curtain, thanks to this picture, does not move aside, and how fortunate that the curtains overlap and keep me trapped in this room. This theater pulls me back so that I look at the mirror again.