Black and grey dotwork griffin with outstretched wings, surrounded by leafy vines, tattooed on the side of a person's ribs.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Griffin with foliage on the side ribs

Dotwork · Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

A winged griffin with a lion's body and an eagle's head and wings is shown in fine stippled dotwork, with the shading built from dense dots. Leafy vines and sprigs curl around the figure and trail down to the lower edge of the design. The image is a close, straight-on photograph of the skin in black and grey ink, with the design filling most of the frame.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Tom,

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The frost has held on the north field for nine days now, and Dad still won't let the ewes into the top paddock. I went up to the old gatepost this morning to see if the snow had buried the lichen. It hasn't. The griffin is still there, the one Grandad's father cut into the stone when he came home from the Somme and found the farm gone to seed. You remember the beak, hooked and open like it's mid-shout, and the wings folded down the side of the pillar. Mum always said it looked hungry. This morning a robin was sat on its head, and the ivy has got right round the forelegs, so the leaves look like they're dragging it back into the hedge.

Mr Pryce from the Lower Farm came by yesterday wanting to buy the stone for his garden. I told him no. He laughed and said I was soft, and maybe I am, but I have been counting the dots in that carving since I was six, thousands of little pecks where Grandad must have worked the chisel through a whole winter. I cannot see the point of selling a thing like that to a man who keeps his bins by the back door.

So I have decided. The new calf is due in February and I want the gate mended before then, and I want you home to help me lift that stone back onto its plinth when the thaw comes. Bring your good gloves. The ivy needs cutting back and I am not doing it alone.

Love, Nell

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