Colour tattoo of dandelion seeds and a blue, pink and purple splash across the upper back, with a few drips below.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Dandelion seeds in a watercolour burst on the back

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A dandelion seed head sits at the centre of a loose burst of blue, purple and pink ink, with fine stems and drifting seeds spreading outwards. The shading is soft and blended, with a few dark drips and dots near the lower edge that add contrast. The tattoo fills the frame across the shoulder blade, with the skin tone and a blurred background around it.

Back Dandelion Seed head Splash Drip Petal

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Marnie, the wind on the headland has been wicked since you left, and the dandelions have taken over the old quarry path the way they always do in the last week of June. I went up yesterday with the kids and a flask of tea, meaning to sit on the wall and watch the boats come in, but I ended up sat in the grass for an hour blowing seed heads at Tomas until he cried for mercy. You'd have laughed. Every puff sent a hundred little parachutes off over the gorse, and they caught the light the way the sea does at six o'clock, all blue and then suddenly pink.

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I've been thinking about what you said before the ferry, that a thing only properly lands once it's let go of. I didn't argue, though I wanted to. I kept one seed head back for myself, pressed flat in the back of my Bible, the way Nan used to keep wishes. It's gone to fluff at the edges now, but the stalk is still stiff, and when I look at it I think of the bloom it came out of, all that colour spent in one go.

The stall at the harbour has a new man running it, a Cornishman with a laugh like a foghorn, and he says the painted pots we used to sell are going to the mainland by the crate now. He asked after you. I said you'd gone to paint the world in a hurry and he said the world could do with a bit of hurry. I told him that was your line, not his.

Write back soon and tell me the city is as loud as you feared. If the gulls there are as rude as ours I'll come and visit and we can go up the hill together, and I'll show you exactly where the wind takes the seeds once it's finished with them.

All my love, Ruth