Three views of a colour Japanese-style half sleeve on the upper arm and shoulder, with teal waves, red blossoms and dark shaded rays.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Japanese waves and blossom half sleeve

Japanese · Upper arm · Mixed · Photo

The tattoo covers the upper arm and shoulder in three angled views against a black background. Teal and blue stylised waves curl across the skin, interspersed with red and orange five-petalled blossoms, with dark grey and black shading behind them. The smooth, bold shading and vivid colour are shown clearly from the front and both sides.

Japanese Upper arm Shoulder Wave Water Flower Blossom Ray

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

You are the one sent down to the slipway with the lantern, because the marquee lights keep failing and Auntie Mair has decided the sea will creep up to the tables if the tide is high enough. Behind you the bride's father is giving his speech about the boat he built the year before she was born, and the groom keeps glancing past the speakers at the water, as though it might take the microphone off him.

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The harbour wall has a mural nobody in the village can date: waves in teal and bruised blue, curling like hair in a wind, and among them blossoms the colour of rust and tangerine, five petals each. Ina Robb painted them the summer she worked at the cannery, then left without telling anyone why. Your mother used to say the blossoms opened only when the boats came in late. You stand beside them with the lantern and count the petals the way children count stairs.

The tide turns. A wave slaps the wall, soaks the hem of your dress, and runs down the paint in silver threads. When it drains back, the blossoms look brighter than they did a minute before, as if the sea had given them a fresh coat. The groom finds you there, asks what you are doing, and you tell him the sea is keeping time for the band.

He takes the lantern and you walk back up the slipway together. Behind you, the water keeps working at the wall, and the orange flowers gleam wet in the dark while the band starts a slow number over the waves.