Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Ornate lion head on upper back

Geometric · Back · Black and grey · Photo

The tattoo shows a lion's head in profile, facing right, with its mane filled with flowing lines, triangles and repeating geometric patterns. The muzzle and nose are finished with stippled dots that give the face texture and shading. The work is entirely in black and grey, and the design fills the frame over the shoulder blade on a light skin tone.

Geometric Dotwork Back Lion Lion head Mane Geometric pattern Profile

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Ilse, The snow shut the Kolka pass on Tuesday and the mule drivers have been sleeping in our stable ever since, so I have had three days to watch old Marek cut the lion. You will say I am making a fuss about a stone face. But you did not see the drawing he made on the back of a wine bill, a lion turned to the right with its mane broken into little triangles and zigzags like the teeth of a saw.

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He will not let me chisel the mane. He says a mane is only lines that have agreed to lie down together, and the trick is in the rhythm, not the weight. So I cut the gutters for him. Every fringe is a row of chevrons, every curl a spiral with a tooth at its end. The muzzle he left for last, and he worked it with a point so fine it made dots, hundreds of them, pressed into the cheek until the stone seemed to breathe through its whiskers.

Yesterday a boy from the freight office asked why a lion should be up on a mountain at all. Marek said lions were never meant for mountains. The wind had carried this one up from the plains in a cart, and it had decided to stay. Then he laughed, put his thumb on the snout and said it was warm, though the stone had been out in frost all week.

The pass opens on Friday, they say. I will be on the first wagon down, and the lion will be left above the gate with its face to the east, where the sun comes over the col. Write back and tell me the post is getting through. Your brother, Anton