A man built a house with five windows, one on each wall and one in the roof. The first window looked out onto a long road climbing a distant mountain, at the top of which was a golden cup. Whenever he reached the summit and lifted the cup, he found it full of air. Years had passed. The second window looked out onto his own garden. He asked small questions and received small answers, fitting together into something quietly enormous. The third window had no view at all — only a sheet of black glass, behind it the things he could not see coming. The fourth window was the loudest. A thousand faces shouting a thousand urgent things insisted he look at it now. When the man sat at this window, hours passed like minutes and he rose feeling hungry without having eaten. The fifth window was in the roof. It did not look out; it looked up. And through it, sometimes, something came down — a shape, an image, a sentence, a small animal made of paint. The man grew old. On his last morning, he walked slowly past the five windows. At the fifth, he emptied his bowl onto the table... ...and what he had caught filled the whole room with light.