I, Mona Lisa (Painting Mona Lisa) by Jeanne Kalogridis

Author:Jeanne Kalogridis [Kalogridis, Jeanne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: 15th Century, Arts, Fiction - Historical, Italy, de Medicis
ISBN: 9780312341398
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2015-04-20T04:00:00+00:00

. . .

During my childhood, I had an experience of pure warmth, of opening, of unconditional union. I had been desperately sick, so sick that the adults surrounding me spoke in muted voices about my death. I remember a terrifying weight on my chest, the sensation of drowning in my own fluids, of not being able to breathe.

They brought up kettles and a wooden trough. They filled it with near-scalding water, and my mother lowered me into it.

Once I was immersed to my neck in the water, its steam settled tenderly on my face; its generous heat permeated my bones. I looked down at my reddening flesh and—thinking the way a child does—thought that it would melt, yield, and merge with the warmth. I closed my eyes, blissful, and felt my skin dissolve until there was nothing but my beating heart and the water. All weight, all heaviness, dispersed into the air.

I was alive. I could breathe.

Being with Giuliano was the same. There was heat; there was opening. There was union. I could breathe.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.