Geometric mandala tattoo below the bust

You asked in your last what Mam did with the pins once the pit lamps went out for good. She kept them in the tin with the broken clasp, the same tin she carried the pricking cards in when we moved from Shildon to the back rows at Ferryhill. I have it open on the table as I write, and the lid smells of machine oil and lavender, which is Mam all over.

Every night after the shift whistle she sat under the gas mantle and pricked the lace patterns onto card, one tiny hole at a time, working out from a single point at the centre. Rings of petals, then rings of dots so close they looked like frost on a window. Da said she could have mapped the whole seam from the way her pins went in. The lace makers in the terrace bought her cards by the dozen, and she never once let me pass a finger over a finished one until every hole had been counted.

The mill closed the spring you went to Leeds, and the cards went to the bottom of the tin. Last Sunday I finally took out the biggest one, a round thing like a sunflower laid flat, and held it to the window. The light came through in a hundred small points, every one in its place, and for a minute the kitchen was full of little stars.

I have pinned it to the wall above the sink. Come home at Easter and look at it with me. Bring the good scissors, the ones she never let anyone else touch.

Love, Annie