Traditional-style tattoo on an arm of a hand holding an hourglass, with a yellow rose, green leaves, seed pods and a red background.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Hand holding hourglass with yellow rose

Traditional · Forearm · Mixed · Photo

A pale hand rises from the bottom of the design to hold an hourglass with a grey shaded top and a blue-edged base. A yellow rose with bold black outlines sits behind it, with green leaves, three green seed pods at the top left and a pink rose in the upper right corner. Bold black outlines and flat areas of solid colour dominate, with the red background behind the central motif.

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The clock over platform two had stopped at ten past four the winter the coal ran out, so Mrs Hebden timed the trains with the hourglass her husband had carried home from a sale at Carlisle. It had a brass cap and a grey sand that never looked quite clean. Each time the bell rang at the crossing she lifted the glass with both hands, turned it, and watched the first thin thread start to fall, and by the time it had emptied the down express was always under the bridge.

Keep reading

Her husband had planted the yellow rose by the signal box the summer they married. It grew up the post and over the wire, and in June it bled through the gaps in the fence until the porters had to cut it back with their penknives. Nobody cut the seed pods. Mrs Hebden said they were for the birds, and the birds did not seem to mind.

On a Tuesday in October a man in a grey coat stepped off the late train with no bag and asked her for a ticket to nowhere in particular. He wanted, he said, to be somewhere the hours did not count. She looked at him for a long moment, then turned the glass over and set it on the ledge between them. "It only counts what it is given," she said. "Then it starts again. That is all a glass is for."

He stood beside her until the sand had run out. Then he went back up the platform and climbed aboard the next train without a ticket, and she did not stop him. She turned the glass once more for the empty track, and a petal from the rose fell onto the sleeper at her feet.

More like this

Traditional style tattoo of a black teapot with orange flowers and teal leaves, with a red and orange moth below, on an upper arm.
Black teapot with flowers and a moth
Traditional style tattoo of a glass jar with three fireflies and red flowers with teal leaves on a forearm.
Firefly jar with red flowers on a forearm
Traditional style colour tattoo on an upper arm showing a corked bottle with a sunset and palm trees, a red rose and green leaves, with an anchor and banner above.
Palm tree bottle and rose on an upper arm
Traditional style tattoo of two colourful mandala flowers with dark green serrated leaves on a calf.
Traditional mandala flowers on a calf
Traditional style colour tattoo of a red-nailed hand above two red roses, gold wheat stalks and red berries, on an arm.
Hand, roses and wheat on an arm
Traditional tattoo of orange flowers with green leaves and red dots on a forearm, with a blue flower at left and a snake head at lower right.
Traditional flowers and snake on a forearm
Colour traditional tattoo on a lower leg showing a swallow, a heart on a banner, a compass and red and purple flowers, with partial banner lettering.
Traditional swallow and compass on a lower leg
Traditional style tattoo of a hand with red painted nails and a pale green cuff on a forearm, with a dark grey shadow silhouette behind it.
Hand with red nails and shadow on forearm
Traditional style tattoo of a grey teacup with curling steam and a red rose with green leaves, placed on the thigh.
Teacup and rose on a thigh
Colour Neo-traditional tattoo of an ornate padlock with a pink heart keyhole and two magenta roses with grey leaves, on the arm.
Padlock heart and two roses on an arm
Black, grey and red tattoo on a calf showing a woman's face, a wolf head and a tribal band across the top and bottom of the design.
Woman's face and wolf with tribal band on calf
Neo-traditional tattoo on a calf of a grey-shaded typewriter key cluster with letters, framed by orange flowers, green leaves and black scrollwork in an oval.
Typewriter keys in a flowered oval on a calf

From the plentytattoo archive, uploaded by a user. Is this your work? Ask for credit or removal.