Colour tattoo of an animal skull with red poppies, dark seed heads and green leaves on the outer thigh, in a botanical neo-traditional style.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Animal skull and poppies on a thigh

Botanical · Thigh · Mixed · Photo

The tattoo shows a pale animal skull with a long snout, partly framed by three red poppies with dark centres, dark seed heads rising above the skull, and green serrated leaves. The skull is rendered with soft grey shading and fine outlines, while the poppies have bold red petals and dark accents. The design fills the outer thigh, with the skull angled across the upper half and the flowers clustered beneath it.

Botanical Neo-trad Thigh Skull Animal skull Poppy Seed head Leaves Flower

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell,

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You will not believe what Dad did with the ewe's skull. He scrubbed it at the trough for two days with washing soda until it went the colour of old piano keys, then he came up the yard with it under his arm like a christening gift and asked where Mum wanted it for the reception. Mum said nowhere near the cake. So it's sitting on the windowsill of the barn office now, between the tins of raddle paint and a jam jar of poppies Ruth picked from the verge on the Harlow road.

The poppies are the bit I can't get over. They came up in the top field after the rain, the same week the ground went soft enough for the marquee pegs, and every hedge between here and the church has gone red. Ruth says a field full of poppies means someone has been turning the soil over for a long time. I told her that sounded like a line from a card, and she threw a seed head at me.

The vicar asked whether we wanted anything "traditional" read out. I said we wanted the bit from Ecclesiastes about the sun rising and the grass springing up, and he looked at me as if I'd asked for a brass band. So it's settled. Ruth wants her hair up with a wire of dried seed heads, and I've said yes, provided nobody mistakes them for confetti.

Come on the Friday. Bring your good shoes, because the lane is a bog, and bring the photos of Grandad's dog, because Dad keeps asking if the skull can have a name. I've said Bramble. He says Bramble was a sheep. We'll see who wins by Saturday.

Love, Tess