Upper back of a person with a botanical grapevine tattoo in fine line linework, with purple grapes and green watercolour leaves across the shoulder blades.

Grapevine across upper back and shoulder

Botanical · Back · Mixed · Photo

A bare upper back shows a grapevine design with bunches of grapes, leaves and curling tendrils drawn in thin grey linework. The grapes and leaves are filled with purple and green watercolour-style wash, with the linework left visible. The vine runs across both shoulder blades, and the head is turned down out of frame on a plain light background.

Botanical Fine line Back Shoulder Leaves Tendril Vine

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Teodor, the vines on the north terrace came through the hail better than Papa feared, though he will not admit it. Half the leaves are shredded and the tendrils lie on the stones like wet string, but the bunches hung low under the wall and the wall kept them. I have been walking the rows with a basket since dawn, counting what the storm left us.

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You asked in your last letter whether the island still needs a stranger with a sketchbook. It does, though not for the reasons you think. Papa has decided the old vine by the chapel, the one grafted by his grandfather from a cutting carried over on a fishing boat, is to be cut down for firewood once it stops bearing. I told him I would draw it first. So for three evenings I have sat on the chapel step with a pencil, tracing every curl the vine makes around the iron gate, and the grey lines look thin and tired beside the real thing.

Yesterday I went to paint the bunches, and the ink ran where I had not meant it to. The purple bled out past the outlines onto the leaves, and the green crept up into the shadow of the grapes as if the vine had decided for itself how it wished to be seen. I nearly wiped it away. Then I remembered Papa saying the wine from that vine always tasted of rain and salt, and I left it.

Come in September if you can. Bring nothing but your hands. The stain is on my fingers now, and it will not come off with soap, so I suppose the vine has decided to keep me too. Your sister sends her love and says the goats have eaten the sketchbook you left on the wall, which I am choosing to believe is a compliment to your drawings. Write soon. Eleni.