Black and grey dragonfly tattoo with swirled wing veins and curling ornament on the upper back near the shoulder blade.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Dragonfly with swirls on upper back

Back · Black and grey · Photo

A dragonfly is drawn in outline with shaded wings, the veins decorated with spirals, and its body built from stacked segments. Curling swirls and a row of dots extend from the tail, and the tail ends in a shaded tip. The design is in black and grey ink on pale skin, photographed close up across the upper back.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell, the dragonfly came back to the pump house this morning, the one with the blue-black body you said looked like a stitched hem. I counted its segments on the rail while the kettle went cold, eleven of them, stacked like beadwork on a christening gown. Mr Pascoe says they only hunt over still water, so the rain barrel must be holding something worth eating, and I have stopped emptying it.

Keep reading

The wind has been wrong since the Feast. Everyone on Gull Holm says so, though nobody agrees on what the right wind would be. The spirals on the wings, the ones Granny Ruth painted over the door in lime wash, have started to lift at the edges. I tried to tell the boat man, and he laughed and said the tide would sort it. He is wrong about most things but always right about the tide, so I am writing to you instead of arguing.

Here is my plan. When the Friday boat comes I will go with it, and I will take the tin of Granny's letters and the brass compass that never points north. You can meet me on the mainland quay with your bicycle lamp. If the dots along the path behind the cottage are still there when we leave, we will count them out loud, one for each year we lost not writing.

I have left the barrel lid off. Come quick before the dragonfly decides it has had enough of us. Love, Maud.

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