Black tribal tattoo with a central plumeria flower and swirling linework across the upper back and shoulder of a woman with her hair up.

Plumeria and tribal swirl on a shoulder

Botanical · Shoulder · Black and grey · Photo

A woman seen from behind shows a black ink tattoo on her upper back and shoulder. A bold plumeria flower with shaded petals sits at the centre, framed by bold tribal-style swirls and solid black bands that curl down the arm. The warm, slightly soft photograph has a plain outdoor background with a grey stone bench and a soda can.

Botanical Shoulder Plumeria Flower Tribal pattern Swirl Woman

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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

Sit closer, all of you, and mind the crab in the sand. No, Ino, leave it be. Where was I? Ah yes, the canoe-builder's son, the one who could read a wave the way your mothers read a pot of fish stew, by the sound it made before it broke.

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He carved a paddle for his sister Mea, who had to cross the reef to the far island to fetch the fire-stones for the winter feast. Along the shaft he cut swirls that curled back on themselves like breakers folding over, and at the tip he set a plumeria bloom, pale as a moon hanging over the lagoon. He told her the flower would open whenever she needed the sea to listen. She laughed at him, the way younger sisters do, and pushed off before the tide had properly turned.

Halfway across, the wind came off the open water and swung her canoe round like a child's spinning top. She gripped the paddle hard, and the carved swirls bit into her palm, and the scent of the flower rose up strong enough to make her eyes sting. Then the petals spread out flat on the water, one after another, and the foam beneath them smoothed into a road. The canoe rode that road all the way to the shingle at Tapuna Point.

When she stepped ashore, the bloom was still on the paddle, but its petals had gone darker at the edges, as if they had drunk a little of the sea. Mea kept the paddle until she was an old woman, and every girl who has sailed the reef since has asked for the flower shaded just that way. So when the wind starts leaning on the palms, you tie a bloom to your paddle and you row like you mean it. Now off to bed, all of you, and take your crab with you.