Full back Japanese style tattoo of a woman in a patterned robe among chrysanthemums and flames, in black and grey ink, across the upper and mid back.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Japanese back piece with woman and flames

Japanese · Back · Black and grey · Photo

A large back piece shows a woman with dark hair and a flower headdress, wearing a patterned robe and surrounded by chrysanthemum-like blooms, with stylised flames rising on both sides. The design is built from bold black outlines with grey and dark brown shading across the robe, flowers and hair, and a short character inscription sits near the right shoulder. The composition fills the whole back, with the figure centred and the flames framing the edges.

Japanese Back Woman Chrysanthemum Flower Flame Robe Kanji Headdress

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Tomasz,

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I have finally got the print back from the framers on Hollins Road, though you will say I should have left it there. The woman is still looking down at her sleeve the way Nan used to, chrysanthemums piled in her hair as if she has just come in from the rain. The flames are still licking up both sides of the paper. I stood in the lift on the way home holding it flat against my chest, and the man from flat 9 asked whether it was a wedding present. I told him it was a rescue.

You remember the night the fifth floor kitchen went up and the whole block smelled of burnt chip fat for a week. Nobody was hurt, thank God, but Nan's flat was on fourteen and the council had the water off for three days, and the print was pinned in the hallway behind the coat rack where the damp got in. When I went back with the rubber gloves, the paper had gone the colour of weak tea, but the black lines held. Every edge of the flames was still sharp. The flowers were the only thing I could make out clearly.

The framer, a quiet Pole with a magnifier on a cord, said the ink was older than the paper it sat on. He turned it over and showed me a red seal, and a little character in the corner that he said meant something like "to keep watch". I did not tell him Nan had insisted the woman was a guard, or a fox, depending on her mood.

I hung it above the cooker last night. It is the warmest wall in the flat, and I think she would approve of the company. Come up on Sunday. Bring the kettle and the good biscuits, and we can argue about whose turn it is to be frightened of fire.

Love, Ania