Traditional colour tattoos of an owl on the upper arm, pink roses with green foliage on the thigh, and a skull on the forearm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Owl, roses and skull tattoos on arm and leg

Traditional · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A person lies on a bed showing several large colour tattoos. An owl holding a candle dominates the upper arm, with bold outlines and detailed feather shading, while pink roses with green leaves wrap across the thigh. A skull with a patterned design sits on the forearm, and a small outlined flower appears lower on the leg.

Traditional Botanical Upper arm Thigh Forearm Owl Rose Skull Flower Foliage Candle Leaves

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mind the step, love, the platform lamp's been out since Tuesday, so we'll have the fire and the kettle for light. Sit where I can see you. There was an owl on the signal box at Shelmerdale the winter the points froze solid, and he kept a candle lit in his foot the way a porter keeps a lantern, because old Amos Tallow had taught him that a line is only safe while somebody is awake to watch it.

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Every night Amos climbed the iron steps with his tin of matches, and the owl would be waiting on the rail, round-eyed and stern as a magistrate. They say the bird never once blinked when the express came through the cutting, and that the drivers sounded their whistles twice for him out of courtesy. Then the wind came off the moor in January and tore the roof clean off the goods shed, and with it went the candle, and there was the 11.40 coming down the single track with no light to show the switch was set wrong.

Well. The owl did not hesitate. He dropped from the rail, took the stub of candle from his own claw, and flew it down to the points, wings beating the sleet into a fog, and held it there until the signal lamp caught and the driver saw the red. Amos found him at first light with his feathers scorched at the tips, still gripping the wax, and he buried him under the rose bush by the platform, which is still there, blooming in spite of the coal dust.

So when you see the box window glowing past midnight, do not go up and knock. It is only the owl keeping watch, and it is only a candle, and the night is still in charge of the line.