Black and grey traditional tattoo of an owl on a branch with blossom, a compass and a banner reading ALL ROADS LEAD HOME, on the upper arm.

Owl, blossom and compass with banner

Traditional · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

An owl perches on a branch beside two five-petalled blossoms, with a compass hanging below and a ribbon banner reading ALL ROADS LEAD HOME across the lower half. The design uses fine engraved-style hatching and cross-hatching for the feathers, petals and banner shading, with bold outlines. The image is entirely black and grey and centred on the tattoo, with a small amount of surrounding skin.

Traditional Botanical Upper arm Owl Blossom Branch Compass Compass rose Banner Ribbon

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The caravan smelt of paraffin and wet canvas, and Marjorie Quill had kept the owl's cage under a sheet for three winters because it was the only thing on the lot she could not bear to sell. Its name was Tuesday. Nobody on the fairground knew why. The owl had come to her from a man who ran the waltzers out of Hull and had lost his nerve on the ferris wheel, and it had sat on the rail of her wagon ever since, turning its head to follow the lights.

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On the last night in Penrith the wind dropped and the tents went slack, and she found the compass on the kitchen table where her son had left it. It was brass, rimmed green, the glass cracked across the north point. He had bought it at a car boot for a pound and promised to fix it before the Lincolnshire run. He had not come back from Lincolnshire. Marjorie wound the chain round her fingers and sat with it until the kettle went cold.

In the morning she opened the cage. Tuesday stood on the sill a long while, feathers puffed against the cold, then dropped to the branch of the apple tree behind the bins and looked back at her with those flat, unhurried eyes. The blossom was out, every bud blown open overnight. Marjorie took the compass from her pocket and held it up to the light so the cracked glass threw its shadow across the lawn.

She had never once thought of the thing as a way home. It was only a way of knowing which direction a person had gone. She stood there until the owl lifted off, flew low over the hedges towards the coast, and then she went inside and began packing the lorry.