Black and grey flash design of the words HOLY SHIT set in a circle, with bold interlocking letters and a halftone texture.

Circular lettering reading HOLY SHIT

Lettering · Black and grey · Flash

The design shows the words HOLY SHIT arranged inside a circle, with the letters stacked and interlocked in a bold, rounded display face. The letters are solid black with a fine halftone or stipple texture across them, and the background is plain white. The composition is centred and self-contained, with no body part or skin visible.

Lettering Lettering Text Circle Word

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Mother Winifred, forgive the hand. I am writing with the good pen, the one I keep for the psalter, because the cellar has gone past ordinary penance and I want the matter on record before the bishop's man arrives on Thursday.

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Brother Osric was lowering the Michaelmas cheeses to the store, as he has done for nine years without incident. One wheel slipped its rope, took the cellar steps like a bishop taking a feast day, and came out into the cloister at full speed. It did not wobble. It did not stop at the well as cheese ought to. It ran the whole circle of the garth, round and round the herb beds, while we stood under the arches and watched. Brother Matthew counted eleven circuits before it settled against the foot of the sundial with a soft and dignified bump.

Father Hugh came out of the chapter house with his reading glasses still on his nose. He studied the cheese for a long while. Then, in the voice he reserves for blessing the fish, he said, 'Holy shit.'

Nobody moved. Osric crossed himself twice. I have never heard him swear in forty years, and I do not think he knew the words were in him. He laughed until he had to sit on the well, and the rest of us followed, and the cheese sat there and kept its own counsel.

He has since asked me to letter the words round the rim of the chapter house bell, in a circle like the cheese, so the whole house will read them each time it rings for Lauds. I have agreed. It is the only prayer I have ever been certain he meant.

Your loving son in Christ, Brother Anselm.