LISABETTA

<p>LEONARDO TAUGHT HIS KID SISTER TO PAINT... ... SHE TAUGHT HIM HOW TO SURVIVE</p><p>A portrait's voice is captured in the eyes. Only beloved eyes may speak the truth in silence. My brother and I conversed this way for eleven years after my death. He called me through the art that was the best of us. I materialized to ease his grief and comfort his final moments.</p><p></p><p>Leonardo heard my thoughts as a voice inside his head as a waking dream inside a memory. I listened back in the ways open to me. Leonardo shared his lifeforce with me the day I was born refusing to let me die and later during his last days when he lay close to death I held his hand so he could feel the weight of my bones.</p><p></p><p>To Leonardo I remained the fleshed-out Lisabetta of his middle-years. Such was our close connection that even as an apparition I had density. Leonardo taught me where illusion began and in 1519 it was my duty to show him where it ended.</p><p></p><p>- Lisabetta</p>