Black and grey dotwork anchor tattoo with a dotted arrow, circle and star motifs on the centre of the chest.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Anchor and arrow tattoo on the chest

Dotwork · Chest · Black and grey · Photo

A black and grey tattoo sits on the centre of the chest, with a solid anchor at the bottom and a column of smaller motifs above it. The motifs include a dotted arrow, a short horizontal bar, a small circle and a cluster of star-like marks, all linked by a dotted line. The linework is built from fine dots and thin strokes, with solid black fill on the anchor, and the photograph is cropped tightly around the tattoo.

Dotwork Fine line Geometric Chest Anchor Arrow Dotted line Star Circle

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell, the harbour wall at Scarrow has been scrubbed white for the regatta, and the whole village smells of bleach and fried dough. I have the boat back on her mooring now, the Marigold, with her new mainsail stitched by old Tam in the loft above the chandlery. He charged me half what he asked for the first one, which is the kind of thing he does when he has decided you are family.

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You asked in your last letter whether the anchor I had inked on my breastbone was still worth the sting after twenty years at sea. I had to laugh. The anchor is the easy part. It is the little column above it that takes the explaining: the dotted arrow pointing north, the bar across it like a yard on a mast, the small ring, and the cluster of stars that Mr Ferris at the parlour in Lerwick insisted on drawing with a needle so fine you could hardly see the ink until it healed. He said the dots were for the nights you cannot see the horizon, and the line joining them was for the way home. I thought it was sentimental nonsense at the time. I still do, mostly.

We lost the Pearl in March, as you heard. Nobody was taken, but we came in with the tiller hanging by a thread, and I stood on the quay with my hand flat against my chest without quite knowing why. Anyway. Come up in August. There is a bed made in the back room, and I have promised Tam a bottle of the good whisky if he will teach you the splice he showed me. Bring the photographs from your Cornwall trip. I want to see whether you finally got the sea into one frame.

Your loving brother, Jack.