Black and grey dreamcatcher tattoo with hanging feathers on a woman's upper back, shown in a monochrome photograph.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Dreamcatcher tattoo on upper back

Back · Black and grey · Photo

A dreamcatcher with a circular hoop, a radiating web and three feathers hanging from its base, drawn in black linework. The lines are fairly bold with some fine detail in the web, and the design is shown in soft monochrome with shading across the back. The tattoo sits centrally on the upper back, with a long hanging line above it and a braided plait with a ribbon over one shoulder.

Back Dreamcatcher Feather Web Braid Ribbon Hair

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell,

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The ship has been rolling for nineteen days now and I have stopped expecting the floor to stay still. Dougie, the bosun's mate, a Glaswegian who has forgotten more knots than I will ever learn, sold me the dreamcatcher in Valparaiso for two dollars and a bottle of rum I did not drink. It is a hoop of willow no bigger than a side plate, bound in thread the colour of weak tea, with three grey feathers knotted to its base. I hung it from the porthole latch in my bunk the first night out, and I have been telling myself since that it is only decoration.

Dougie says the web is meant to snag bad dreams the way a net snags a dropped spoon, and that the good ones slip through the middle to find you. I told him that was the sort of thing a man says when he has been at sea too long. He laughed and said I would believe anything by the Horn.

Last night I dreamt of our mother's kitchen with the back door open and the wind coming in, and I woke with the ship groaning like a barn and a feather brushing my cheek. The porthole was shut. The web was still. I lay there counting the strands until the light came up grey, and I do not know yet whether that was the thing catching the bad dreams or the thing letting the good one go.

I am sending this with the pilot launch at Montevideo, so you will have it sooner than I will see you. Keep the kettle warm. If the wind comes round to the west, open the back door and let it in for me.

Love, Clara