Neo-traditional tattoo of a black panther with yellow accents and flower details, running along the inner forearm.

Black panther with yellow flowers on a forearm

Neo-trad · Forearm · Mixed · Photo

A black panther is shown in profile, with its head turned toward the viewer, whiskers drawn in long yellow strokes and a raised paw in the lower corner. The panther is heavily shaded in black and grey with smooth gradients, and it is outlined in bold black linework with yellow highlights on the ears, eye and flowers. Yellow chrysanthemum-style blooms frame the animal on both sides against the skin tone.

Neo-trad Japanese Forearm Panther Cat Paw Whiskers Chrysanthemum Flower

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

Nobody aboard the Marguerite Ash believed me when I said the cat in the lazarette was a panther, so I stopped saying it and fed it instead. It came up through the grating on the third night out of Lisbon, black as the coal bunker, and sat in my galley doorway with its tail wrapped round its feet like a man waiting for a late tram. Its eyes were the yellow of the mustard tin on the shelf above the range. I tore it the heel of the loaf, and it ate with its head turned towards me, whiskers spread stiff and long as piano wire, as if checking I was taking it seriously.

Keep reading

Dougal Pirie, our chief engineer, wanted it put over the side. He said a ship could carry a cat or a cook's temper, not both. At Funchal I bought a bundle of yellow chrysanthemums from a woman with a barrow by the harbour wall and set them in a jam jar on the mess table. In the morning the panther was asleep between the stems with one forepaw tucked under its chin. Dougal stopped talking about the side after that. He began leaving his biscuits on the tin lid, and he never once said the word panther out loud.

The weather turned off Finisterre. The galley went over at a slant and everything not nailed down began its own voyage: pans, onions, the jar of flowers. I was on my knees with the stock pot when the cat walked across the tilted deck as though the floor were level, set one broad paw on the handle, and held it there while the sea rolled under us. The paw was warm through the iron. When the ship came back upright the pot had not spilled a drop, and the panther was gone, leaving four floury prints across the tiles and a single yellow petal stuck to the stove door.

We reached Hull with a full hold and a crew that swore nothing had happened. Some mornings I still find a petal in my apron pocket, bright as a coin, and I leave the tin lid open for whoever it was.