Black ink crescent moon tattoo with ornamental swirls on the inside of an ankle, shown in a close-up photo against a dark background.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Crescent moon with swirls on an ankle

Ankle · Black and grey · Photo

A crescent moon is drawn in black ink with ornamental swirls and curling lines filling its curved body. The linework is fine and even, with some areas of solid black accents and light shading along the edges. The tattoo sits centrally on a light-skinned ankle, with the dark background framing it.

Ankle Crescent moon Moon Swirl Ornament

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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

Hush now, the lift's out again, so you'll have to hear this one with your knees under your chin. Before Harcourt House had its name painted on the bins, the moon hung low over the car park, thin as a fingernail, because a boy called Tobiah Brand had been climbing it for conkers, or so the caretaker claimed. Every night he went up the drainpipe on the north side, hooked his fingers over the silver edge, and pulled off curls of light to fill his pockets.

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The moon noticed. It had no mouth, but it had a way of making the bins rattle when it was cross. One night it sent down a wind with ribbons in it, black ribbons that curled and knotted round the boy's ankles like ivy round a gate, and it spoke in the voice of wet pavement. Give back what you've taken, it said, or stay and mend me.

Tobiah spent a week trying to unpick the knots with his teeth. Every time he slipped one loop loose, another swirl pulled tight somewhere else, until one morning the ribbons had drawn the moon itself into a neat crescent, scrolled and filigreed like a christening spoon. The boy came down the drainpipe for the last time with empty pockets, and the moon went back to its place looking far too pleased with itself.

So when the stairwell lamp flickers, that's the moon checking for pockets. Mind yours. And if you see a boy with black ribbons at his ankles, don't ask him the time. Now, who wants the bit where the caretaker gets his teeth back?