Black and grey blackwork tribal sleeve with swirls, dots and triangles covering the upper arm and shoulder of a person shown from the back in a sepia photograph.

Black tribal sleeve on upper arm and shoulder

Blackwork · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

A full sleeve of bold black tribal-style linework covers the upper arm and reaches onto the shoulder, built from large swirling scrolls, circular motifs, diamonds, dots and zigzag triangles. The solid black fills and fine outlines contrast strongly against the pale skin. The sepia-toned photograph is taken from behind and to the side, with the tattoo as the main focus against a soft, blurred landscape.

Blackwork Geometric Upper arm Shoulder Tribal Sleeve Swirl Dot Triangle Diamond Zigzag

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The boat was called Little Sister, and she went out past the reef every morning before the sun cleared the ridge. Tomas Vaea had the steering of her, and he did not trust the water when it went quiet. Quiet meant the current was turning under the hull, and a turning current could take a line and a man's nerve together.

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Mere Ioane, who lived in the last house before the mangroves, had painted the pattern on the prow the spring he bought the boat. She mixed soot with coconut oil and worked it in with a comb of bone. The big scrolls were the foam that curls back on itself. The rings were the sun, the moon and the drowned, which she said must always be counted. The diamonds were the fish that follow the boat, and the zigzags were the teeth of the reef, so the reef would see its own shape on the wood and think twice.

One grey morning the lines went slack and a pale spiral lifted off the water beyond the gap. Tomas laid his thumb on the prow and counted the rings the way Mere had taught him, one, two, eleven. Then he turned the bow toward the zigzag opening the painting showed him, and the sea let them through as if it had been asked politely.

At dusk he tied up and carried the catch past her house. She was sitting in the dirt with a stick, drawing circles in the sand. "Did you keep count?" she asked. He said eleven, and she nodded and drew a twelfth circle around the others, leaving it open at the bottom for the water to come in.