Two sheets showing the word POWER stacked vertically in bold serif capitals, purple letters with an offset orange shadow, shown as a lettering design rather than on skin.

POWER lettering design on two transfer sheets

Lettering · Colour · Flash

Two rectangular sheets show the word POWER stacked letter by letter in a bold, slab-like serif typeface. Each letter is purple with an orange offset shadow that creates a layered, letterpress-like effect. The sheets sit side by side on a flat purple background, with the lettering set upright on the left sheet and the right sheet slightly lower.

Lettering Word Letter Serif

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell, the proof came off the press at half past four and Mr Ashby held it to the window the way he holds anything he doesn't trust. Four lines of POWER, set in the heavy slab face we keep in the top drawer, each letter pulled in plum ink with a second run of orange printed a hair askew beneath it. He said the register was shot. I said it looked as though the letters were walking off the paper.

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He told me to break the forme and reset it true. I did, all of Thursday, locking each piece of type into the chase with the quoins until my knuckles bled. But the orange had already gone into the stock for the Whitworth order, and the customer wanted the ghost, so Ashby sent one sheet down to the sorting room with a note that said only mistake, keep it. Mrs Greaves, who runs the bench there with forearms like a dockhand, pinned it above her cutting table, and it has been looking down at her ever since.

Here is the odd part. Since then I catch myself reading the word backwards whenever I set a line, reversing each letter so the shadow falls the right way, and I can't stop. It is only five letters, and most days the one I need is the one under my thumb.

Yesterday I set it again, on purpose this time, with the orange nudged a little to the left. Mr Ashby saw it and said nothing, which from him is a blessing. Tell Mother the wages are coming and that I am learning to lean on the letters. Your brother, Tom.