Black and grey shaded tattoo of seven moon phases in a row along the ribs, with black lace fabric above.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Moon phases tattoo along the ribs

Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

A row of seven circles runs horizontally across the side of the ribcage, each shaded to show a different moon phase from new to crescent. The shading is soft and grainy in black ink, and the circles are evenly spaced with the darkest filled at the centre. The black and white photograph is framed closely on the torso, with black lace fabric across the top edge.

Ribs Moon Moon phase Circle Crescent Celestial

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Tuesday, and the wind backed round to the west before the kettle had boiled, so Mr Hallam sent the boy down for the oilskins. I have kept the tide book by hand since my father's eyes went, and the moon has to sit beside the tide figures or they mean nothing. Each evening I shade a little more of it in pencil, the way he taught me, and I do not trust the almanac for that.

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The boy, Owen, is nine and thinks the moon is a lamp someone forgets to light. Last night he counted the phases on his fingers and lost his place at the waning half. I drew them for him on the back of the tide sheet: seven circles in a row, new at one end, a sliver at the other, and the full one in the middle, shaded darkest where the pencil pressed hardest. He asked which one was tonight. I told him the sixth, which was true, though it was hard to say through the cloud.

Father always said the sea answers to the moon and the moon answers to nobody. I used to think that was a sad thing to say about a man who had kept the same light for thirty years. Now I think he meant it kindly, that there is one thing on this coast that keeps its shape without anyone needing to watch it.

This morning the cloud broke at four. The crescent hung over the Farne rocks, thin as a fingernail, and Owen came pounding up the stairs to tell me it had come back. I said it had never gone anywhere. He did not believe me, so I let him think it was his doing, and wrote the hour in the book.