Fine line botanical tattoo of a pink poppy with a red script word trailing from it, on a shoulder near the collarbone.

Poppy and script on a collarbone

Fine line · Shoulder · Colour · Photo

A small watercolour-style poppy in pink and red sits at the top of the shoulder, with a thin red script word trailing to the right along the collarbone. The flower has soft, blended shading with fine petal edges, while the script is a delicate single-needle line. The shot is taken close up against a plain white background, with a thin gold chain and part of the hair visible at the upper edge of the frame.

Fine line Botanical Shoulder Poppy Flower Script

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

Dear Ada,

Keep reading

The seeds came in the post with your letter, tipped out onto my palm at the nurses' station like grit from a coat pocket. I've pinned the envelope above the sluice sink where Sister Mackie won't see it. It's eleven o'clock on a Tuesday, the ward gone quiet except for Mr Hadley breathing behind his curtain, and I keep turning the little dark seeds over with my thumb. You always did say a poppy would grow anywhere you threw it, even on the gravel by the coal bunker.

Thursday was bad. Bed nine went down before the porter came, and I held her hand while the monitor kept drawing its green line until it didn't mean anything. Afterwards I walked to the dispensary and stood among the brown bottles for a full minute doing nothing, which is not allowed. Then I came back and finished the drug round, because the others were still asleep and somebody had to be awake for them.

Here's what I want to tell you. On the walk home at dawn, the verge outside the hospital gates had gone red overnight, a whole patch of papery petals like someone had spilt wine on the grass. I stood there with my bag digging into my shoulder and thought, well, that's the lot of us. We come up, we flare for a morning, and then we're gone. It wasn't a comfort exactly. It was a relief to see something be so careless with itself.

I'll plant the seeds in the window box on Sunday. Write and tell me if Edinburgh has any gravel left for them.

Love, Nell