Black and grey realism tattoo of a grim reaper with a scythe, an hourglass filled with coins and cherubs, covering the upper arm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Grim reaper and hourglass on an upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

A hooded grim reaper holds a scythe above a large hourglass, with a skeletal hand reaching into the upper bulb. Inside the lower chamber, skulls, coins and small cherub figures are shown, and a soft cloud-like shading surrounds the design. The work uses smooth black and grey shading with strong contrast on the reaper's robe and the glass, set against the curve of the arm on a plain black background.

Realism Upper arm Grim reaper Hourglass Scythe Skull Coin Cherub Skeleton hand

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Walter, the hourglass came off the 4.12 from Leeds, wrapped in an old timetable and tied with luggage string. Mr Pryce at the parcels desk says nobody has claimed it in six weeks, so it is mine to mind until the end of the month. It is a heavy thing, brass rails and black glass, with a hooded figure perched on top like a crow on a gatepost and a scythe laid across its knees. In the lower bulb someone has tipped a little heap of coins and two plaster cherubs, one with a wing snapped off, and the sand has been running down over them since the carriage jolted.

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I know what you'll say. You'll say I've been reading too many of Mrs Hurst's penny dreadfuls in the waiting room. But I timed the sand against the clock above platform two, and it runs nearly four minutes slow every hour, and I can't shake the feeling that a thing like that ought to be wrong on purpose.

Last night, after the last train had gone and the lamps were turned down, I found a ticket stub from Hull lodged in the neck of the glass. It was dated the morning Dad went north, the one we never talk about. The cherub nearest the sand had turned its face towards the door, and I'm fairly sure it hadn't done that on Monday.

I've set it on the ledge in the ticket office where the 6.40 lights catch it. Each time a train pulls out I turn it over, though I can't tell whether I'm slowing the sand or hurrying it along. Come home for Easter, if the boat fares allow. Bring the good pencil. Ada.