White ink tattoo on a wrist showing a fine line infinity symbol, the word faith in script, and three small swallows, in a Fine line lettering style.

Infinity symbol with faith script and swallows

Fine line · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A close photograph of a wrist with a white ink tattoo, which shows as pale raised lines against the skin. An infinity loop runs across the wrist, with the word faith written in flowing script inside its right-hand curve and smaller script beneath reading heb, followed by faint marks. Three small swallows in flight sit above the loop, and the fine, even linework and soft natural lighting give the piece a delicate look.

Fine line Lettering Forearm Infinity symbol Script Faith Swallow Bird Wrist

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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

Sit down and mind the pot, the lot of you. Aye, that's the bread out of the oven, so leave it cool or you'll have the crust in your teeth. Now, the swallows. Every deckhand on the Humber knew a swallow meant land inside a day, and old Tobias Greer swore by it. He had three of them above the loop on his wrist before he ever had a wife to show them to.

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He sailed the coaster Marigold for eleven winters, cooking for six men who ate like the sea was chasing them. Each time she came round the Spurn light he'd count the swallows along the rail, and each time he'd say the same thing, that faith was a thing you couldn't see until you'd already started walking. The mate said that was an old book's line. Tobias couldn't have told you which book. His grandmother had written it on a card and tucked it in his tin of tea, and that was all the scripture he needed.

In the spring the Marigold went down off Flamborough, Tobias was the only one who kept his head and the only one who came ashore. He walked three miles to Bridlington with his pockets full of cold water, and the first thing he did was find an inker working by paraffin lamp above a bakery. He asked for the words to run round the loop in white, because he wanted something the sea could not darken.

Forty years on, I'm the one holding his cup. He'd turn his wrist to the galley window and tap the old line with his thumb, the substance of things hoped for, and then he'd pour the tea. The swallows came back first that spring, and he said that proved the ink was right. I never told him swallows come back every spring. Some things you let a man keep.