Close photo of a black and grey crown above the words Keep Calm and Carry On, a lettering tattoo on the inner forearm near the wrist.

Crown and Keep Calm lettering on a wrist

Lettering · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A dark blue-black crown sits above the words KEEP CALM and CARRY ON in a bold serif typeface, with the smaller word AND set between the lines. The lettering and crown are solid, clean fills with fine detail in the crown's points and arches, shown against a soft, blurred background. The ink is in shades of dark grey and black, and the composition centres the design vertically along the inner forearm.

Lettering Forearm Crown Text Lettering

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The tide was out when the tin trunk came ashore below Gannet Steps, and Mabel Crane was the only one on the quay quick enough to open it before the gulls did. Inside, wrapped in oilcloth, lay a stack of printed cards, each the width of a hand, bearing a crown and three words in heavy black letters. The fishermen had seen such cards in the Post Office window the summer before. They knew the crown for the king's, though none of them could say what the words were meant to do.

Keep reading

Mabel took one home and nailed it above the door of the net loft, where the wind could not get at it. The harbourmaster said it was an order to stay in port. The widow Pascoe said it was a dare. Mabel said nothing and read it each morning with her tea, then walked down to the boats anyway, because the mackerel did not wait on anybody's opinion.

On the third day of the fog, the Marigold did not come in. The town stood on the quay until dark, and then Mabel went up to the loft and took down the card. She folded it twice and put it in her coat. When the Marigold finally nosed through the mist at first light, her skipper climbed onto the steps with his hands split and a card of his own showing at the edge of his pocket, soft as cloth from handling.

After that, nobody in Saltcombe put to sea without one. The cards wore thin at the folds and the crown faded to a shadow, but the words stayed black and plain, and the children learned to read them before they learned their letters.