Black linework drawing of a pointed-eared head with a branching tree motif and red accents, set in a dotted halo, shown as a tattoo design.

Horned tree-crowned head with red drips

Dotwork · Mixed · Flash

A pointed-eared figure with white eyes has a dense branching tree pattern growing from the top of its head, with red accents on the leaves and eyes. Red drips run down from the nose, and a ring of dots and dashes frames the head. The linework is fine and black with grey shading on a plain grey background.

Dotwork Head Tree Branches Eye Blood Halo Dot Figure

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell, don't tell Mum I've started writing at work again, but the lamp in the hut is the only one in Cutler's Yard that still works, and the rest of the night is mine to waste on paper.

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Last Tuesday the plane tree by the old gasworks gate split open at the crown, and out of the cleft came a head. It was grey as wet slate, with ears like folded card and eyes gone white, as if someone had boiled the colour out of them. Branches grew from its scalp faster than I could count, a whole crown of them, and every leaf had a red vein that pulsed. It looked at me the way the foreman looks at a late clock card.

When it opened its mouth nothing came out but a thin red thread from its nose, running down over its lips and dripping onto the flags. Where it fell, dandelions pushed up through the cracks in a single breath. The council men came at dawn with their hi-vis and their tarpaulin, and by lunchtime there was only a stump and a ring of white stones laid in a circle, which I didn't remember anyone putting down.

I haven't told the gaffer the rest. Every night since, I go out at two and leave a mug of tea on the stones. This morning the mug was empty, and in the saucer lay one leaf, red at the edges, with fine black veins that spelt out my name. I'll bring the good biscuits on Sunday. Keep the kettle warm for me. Your loving brother, Frank.