Folio 98732972

Italiano

Padre carissimo,

I write to you of the letter R because it is the tongue that rolls in the throat like a small river stone, and because it is the letter that begins the name you did not give me but that I carry anyway — Leonardo — and because when I draw the profile of a face the R of the nose, the R of the brow, the R of the beard, all must be in their place or the face is not a face but a question without an answer.

I have been studying the way the R sits in the mouth of the French when they speak, and it is not the R of the Italians. Theirs is soft, almost a growl that dissolves, while ours is sharp, a blade that does not cut but insists. I wonder if this is why their words feel less certain to me, as if they are always holding something back.

The canal outside my window is full of reflections that tremble with the R of the ripples, and I think of how the water writes what the air cannot hold. The hand still trembles, but the R on the page does not. It is steady. It is the only steady thing.

I have been trying to draw the R in the wing of a bird, but the feathers will not obey. They insist on being curves where I need angles, and I think this is because the R is not a curve but a direction. It is the letter that points, that insists, that refuses to be anything but itself.

I wonder if you remember the day you took me to the notary’s office and had me apprenticed to Verrocchio. You did not say it, but I think you knew that the law would not hold me, that the R of my name would not fit in the ledger. You gave me to the workshop instead, and for that I am grateful.

The candle gutters. The R in the dark is the only thing that does not flicker.

Vostro figlio affettuoso.