Black and grey traditional tattoo on a calf showing a tent, pine trees and stars inside a crescent moon, with the word HOMESICK arched above.

Homesick tent and moon on a calf

Traditional · Calf · Black and grey · Photo

The design shows a small tent and a boot-like shape resting within a crescent moon, with pine trees, a hill and four stars above. The word HOMESICK is set in an arc above the motif, and three drips hang from the base of the moon. The work uses bold black outlines, solid black fills and grey shading, with stippled texture on the tent and the trees.

Traditional Dotwork Calf Tent Moon Pine tree Star Boot Lettering

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nan, the mate says we raise the Horn in nine days if the wind holds, and I have stopped trusting anything that holds. Last night the moon came up as a thin paring over the swell, its bright side turned away from us so it looked like a bowl somebody had tipped. I watched it through the whole of my watch and thought of the pines behind Glen Affric, where you pegged our green tent into the needles because the ground was too stony for pegs.

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I still have Grandad's boot in my kit bag. Don't laugh. It is the left one, the one with the split heel he never got round to mending, and I wear it up on deck because the iron rungs are cold and it keeps my foot from going numb. The cook says I look like a wading heron. I told him herons at least know where they are going, which is more than I can say for us.

Something has gone wrong with the water barrels, and the bosun has us on half measure until Port Stanley. I am not telling you this to frighten you. I am telling you because you said I never wrote down the small things, and the small thing tonight is that the stars out here are so many they stop being stars and become weather. I counted four I knew from the tent door, then lost count, then put my hand on the rail and found it wet, and I was crying like a boy, which I will deny.

Tell Mam the tent is folded in the chest with the good blanket. I'll unpack it the day I come up the lane. Until then, leave the porch light on, and tell the moon I said hello, though I suspect it has been looking at you more than at me.