Black and grey drawing of an anatomical heart with branching tree limbs rising above it and a honeycomb hemisphere with spikes beneath, on aged paper.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Anatomical heart with branches and honeycomb

Realism · Black and grey · Flash

The drawing shows a realistically shaded anatomical heart with its vessels visible, topped by a spreading tree of bare branches. Beneath the heart sits a dome of hexagonal honeycomb cells with radiating spikes, and a small round seal bearing the word SANCTUS sits at the lower left. The fine pencil-style linework and soft shading are in black and grey on a sepia, stained paper background.

Realism Heart Tree Branches Honeycomb Hexagon Spike Anatomical heart

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Tom, the swarm found the Mercy Ann again this morning, a dark rope of them pouring off the old elm at Hythe Lock and settling on the cabin roof as if they'd been sent for. Dad would have called it luck. I said nothing and fetched the skep from under the tarpaulin, the one with the wax seal Mum pressed into the lid, the little round one with SANCTUS round its rim. You'll remember she never let anyone open it without washing their hands first.

Keep reading

The honey is dark this year. Nothing like the pale stuff from the orchards at Stanwell. It tastes of the river, of wet iron and the cress that grows under the bridge. I took two jars up to the Harrow Street market on Saturday, and a woman with a bad hip bought one without haggling and asked whether the bees were the old strain. I told her they were the only strain we had. She said that was how her grandfather used to talk about the Church, which I took as a compliment.

The bare elm is down now. The wind took it in February, and it lay across the towpath for three days until the council men came with their saws. I kept one long limb back and lashed it to the cabin rail, because the bees seem to like something to climb. Every evening they crawl up it in a line, as though the branches are giving them directions. I have stopped trying to understand it.

Come up in June if you can, and bring the boy if she lets you. There's room on the roof, and there's still a jar with your name on it, though I'm holding it back for a bad day and would rather you didn't make me use it. The lock-keeper says the water's high. Mind the weir.

Your sister, Ruth