Fine line tattoo of a needle with a looping thread in black ink on the inner forearm of a person wearing a dark top.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Needle and thread on a forearm

Fine line · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A single needle with a loose length of thread curling above and below it, drawn in thin black linework. The tattoo sits on the inner forearm against a plain pale skin tone, with a wooden plank background. The composition is centred and simple, with no shading or added colour.

Find an artist for this

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

The wind on Hollin Pass takes the buttons first, then the seams, so by the time a traveller reaches my hut at the top of the switchbacks their coat is more hope than cloth. I keep my needles in a tin that once held barley sugar, with a spool of black thread longer than my arm. Nobody asks me to mend anything. They stand in the doorway, hold out their sleeves, and wait to see whether I will.

Keep reading

The winter my brother went over the col with the mule train, I sat at the window and strung a single length of thread between the two posts of my gate, knotting it through the iron hasp at each end so it sagged and bowed in the gusts. Mother said it looked like a washing line for ghosts. I said it was a way of keeping count. Every carrier who came up from the valley had to duck beneath it, and every one of them touched it, the way you touch a doorframe to be sure of where you are.

The mule train came back in March. My brother walked at the front with a bundle of blankets and a limp, and the first thing he did was reach up and grip the thread, the way I had known he would. It had frayed in two places and I had knotted it again each time. He counted the knots aloud, then laughed until he coughed.

I still have the needle. It is the one I used on his coat that night, left threaded with black and pushed into the cloth, because some things you do not pull free until you are certain they will hold.

More like this

Thin black fine line tattoo of a continuous looping abstract design on a forearm, shown against a beige tiled floor.
Fine line abstract squiggle on a forearm
Fine line tattoo of a needle with a looping dotted thread running down the inside of a forearm.
Needle and thread tattoo on a forearm
Black ink snake coiling around a forearm, its body filled with lace-like ornamental patterns in a blackwork style.
Snake with lace pattern on a forearm
Fine line black tattoo of a single unbroken wave crossing the forearm.
Single line wave on a forearm
Small fine line black arrow tattoo running diagonally along the inner forearm of a light-skinned arm, with feathered fletching at one end.
Fine line arrow on a forearm
Black line tattoo of Zero, the ghost dog, with a small red nose, on the ankle of a pale-skinned person against a leafy patterned background.
Zero the ghost dog on an ankle
Small black fine line tattoo of an antler on the upper arm, set against a red plaid fabric background.
Antler outline on upper arm
Close view of a black fine line wave tattoo running across a sun-tanned limb against a plain light background.
Black fine line wave tattoo on skin
Fine line tattoo of two reaching hands in dark ink on the inner wrist and forearm, with a bare hand with red nail polish and silver rings extended beside it.
Two reaching hands on an inner wrist
Small fine-line black tattoo of an open book on the inner wrist of a raised hand, against a red background.
Open book on a wrist
Black and grey fine line tattoo of a single curling wave-like line running down the inner forearm, with a knitted jumper sleeve pushed up.
Single line wave on a forearm
Black and grey photo of a bold, abstract swirling flourish tattoo on the inner wrist and forearm, in a blackwork style.
Black swirl flourish on a wrist

From the plentytattoo archive, uploaded by a user. Is this your work? Ask for credit or removal.