Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Black and grey traditional flash sheet

Traditional · Black and grey · Flash

A sheet of hand-drawn flash designs on white paper, including a skull with a rose, a crescent moon with a face, an anatomical heart, a horseshoe, a clover, a shell, a coffin and a tooth. The linework is bold and dark, with solid black fills and grey wash shading that gives the motifs depth. All the designs are in black and grey, arranged loosely across the page with space between them.

Traditional Skull Rose Moon Heart Eye Horseshoe Clover Shell Coffin Cross

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Mags, The lock-keeper at Hythe Bridge has finally paid me for the coal, so I can write properly now and not on the back of a bill. I'm sending you the sheet Uncle Tobias left in the cabin chest. You'll remember him at his bench in Pimlico, the lightermen queuing down the stairs. He drew these for the men who worked the barges, something to see them through the winter.

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Look at the moon with the face. He always said it was the only sweetheart who never asked where you'd been. I've nailed the horseshoe above the tiller because the water past the weir is wicked, and the clover is for Dad, who never once came home sober on a Saturday. The heart with the rope round it, the shell, the coffin with the little cross on the lid. I asked him why he'd drawn a coffin among all those roses, and he said everyone needs somewhere to put the things they aren't ready to bury.

Last night I found the tooth. It was wrapped in brown paper at the bottom of the drawer, labelled in his hand: 'Pulled for the boy who wouldn't pay.' I laughed until the kettle boiled over. Then I noticed the planchette had been scratched with a date, and it was the week before he went down the river for good.

I'm keeping the sheet pinned by the stove and the tooth in the drawer. Come up in May. The moon will be out early over the lock, and you can tell me whether his face looks more like Dad's or like mine. Bring the good tin of tea. Your sister, Nell.