Black linework botanical tattoo of a sprig with a small bird and orange dots, with dotwork shading behind, on the side of the ribs.

Botanical sprig and bird on ribs

Botanical · Ribs · Mixed · Photo

A branching sprig of wheat-like stalks, leaves and seed heads runs diagonally across the side of the torso, with a small bird perched near the upper right. Fine black linework and solid black leaf fills sit over a stippled dotwork background, with two orange-filled circles at the lower left. The composition is open and asymmetrical, with the sprig sweeping from the waist towards the ribs.

Botanical Dotwork Ribs Sprig Wheat Leaves Bird Seed head Dot Circle Stem Branch

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Hesper, the barley came in early this year, and Mother says it is the wind off the salt marsh that does it, though Father swears it is the stone wall he built crooked in the spring. I have been carrying sheaves since Tuesday and my hands are split along the knuckles, so forgive the smudges. The sparrow that nested in the hayloft has taken to sitting on the gate post each morning, watching me like a clerk who expects a bribe. I have named him Mr Pell after the magistrate in Fenwick, because he has the same flat little head and the same way of looking through you.

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You asked whether the dotted fields near the river still flood. They do, but less than they did before the Harrowby sisters dug their ditches, and the lichen on the old boundary stones has spread into a pattern I can only describe as lace. I sat with it on Sunday while the kettle boiled. Two orange discs of sun came up through the mist over the far hedge, one after the other, and I thought of the cider barrels you left behind in the cellar, and how you always said we would finish them together.

There is a seed head I have been saving for you in the tin with the broken lid. It is the tallest one from the north field, and the grains rattle when you shake it, like someone counting coins in another room. Come at harvest. Bring your sister if she still will not speak to you, and I will show you where the stalks bend low enough to lie down in. Mr Pell will keep an eye on us both.

Yours in dust and good weather, Tom