Black ink fine line drawing of an arrow with a feather-shaped fletching on white paper, shown as a tattoo design with no body placement visible.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Arrow and feather line design

Fine line · Black and grey · Flash

A single arrow runs diagonally from the upper left, with an open triangular arrowhead and a long, curving feather-like fletching of pointed leaf shapes along the shaft. The linework is thin and even in black ink, with small dots at the tips of the feather sprigs. The drawing is in plain black on cream paper, with no shading or colour, and the composition fills most of the frame.

Fine line Arrow Feather Leaves

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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

Nobody claims the things that matter most at Carrowby Junction. They come in on the 16:40 from Leeds, wrapped in newspaper, and I log them in the ledger with the same pencil I use for umbrellas. The arrow arrived on a Thursday in March, wedged behind the bench on platform four, its shaft so thin I nearly snapped it lifting it out.

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The feathers were not feathers, not really. Someone had cut leaves from card, painted the tips black and glued them in pairs along the shaft, and the head was a folded triangle of tin. I put it on the shelf beside a single glove and a violin case nobody had opened since last winter. For a week it leaned there, pointing at the clock, and I told myself I was waiting for a name.

The name came on the Friday in the shape of a girl with a cough and a ticket for the wrong train. She described the arrow before I had mentioned it: blue ink on the shaft, a lopsided crown on the end. When I held it out she didn't take it straight away. She asked whether it had ever flown anywhere. I said I didn't know. She said that was fine, it had been meant to land somewhere different anyway, and she walked off towards the bridge without it.

I still have it. It sits propped by the kettle, the tin head angled at the departures board, so that each time the boards flip I feel it go off, a little unfinished, towards somewhere I have never been.