Black geometric grid tattoo on a shaved scalp, shaded to look like a receding tunnel, shown from behind and in a three-frame sequence with a finger pointing at its centre.

Grid vortex tattoo across a shaved scalp

Geometric · Other · Black and grey · Photo

The tattoo covers the back and top of a shaved head with a curved grid of dark square cells that narrows into a central point, creating a three-dimensional tunnel effect. The cells are filled with solid black and fine grey shading, with a faint pink tone near the centre and a lighter area where the grid lines meet the skin. The top photo shows the head from behind beside a sink, and the lower strip shows three close frames of a hand pointing at the centre of the design.

Geometric Other Grid Head Finger

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Ruth,

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The grid went down on the Harcombe plot on Tuesday, and by Thursday I had squared the whole field into cells of four yards, one hundred and twelve of them curving inward like the rings of a cut pear. Mr Pascoe says his grandfather laid the old orchard out that way, with a theory about light and fruit. I think he had a theory about being contrary. Every tree sits at a crossing, and every crossing bends a little closer to the hollow at the centre, where the ground has gone soft and the windfalls drop without a sound.

I took the chain down to the middle yesterday with a plumb bob and a notebook. The line never reached the bottom. Each cell I measured looked the same size as the one before it, yet my sums said they were shrinking. When I pressed a finger to the soil at the centre, it came away pink with clay and cold as a well. Pascoe laughed and said the trick is to keep your eye on the last square and never on the hole.

I am posting the drawings with this. Check the bearings against the parish map, would you, and tell me if your numbers agree with mine. I have a feeling they will only agree if we both stand very still.

Yours, Tom