Black and grey lettering tattoo of a three-line quote beside an outlined heart with a lightning bolt, on the side of the ribs.

Quote and heart with lightning bolt on side

Lettering · Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

A three-line quote in a typewriter-style serif font runs across the skin of the side of the torso, reading from left to right with each line slightly angled. To the right, a simple black outline of a heart is split by a jagged lightning bolt. The ink is solid black with no shading, set against pale skin with a fabric edge visible at the top of the frame.

Lettering Ribs Quote Heart Lightning bolt

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

The rope had frayed to the thickness of a thumb by the time Ilse reached the Shelf of Varro, and below her the valley of Sennmark was a grey pit full of cloud. Her brother Anton was somewhere under it, or across it, depending on which herder's story she believed. Lightning cracked the ridge again and she flattened herself against the rock, counting the seconds until the thunder came.

Keep reading

Behind her, the bell at Thal had been silent since dusk. The old ringer had sent her up with the chapel key and a lantern that would not stay lit. She could not look down. She could not look up at the black sky splitting over the peaks either. Each time she tried, the ground tilted and her stomach turned to water, and she was sure she would stay on that ledge until the mountain forgot her.

"You can look at my boots," said a voice at her elbow. It was Tobiah, the goatherd's son who had argued with her in the market two summers ago. He sat with his knees drawn up, soaked to the skin, and she had not heard him climb after her. "Look at my boots, Ilse. I'm not going anywhere."

She fixed her eyes on the cracked leather, the mud, the knotted laces, and found she could breathe. Together they edged along the shelf until the rock opened and a small light flickered under the overhang. Anton had built a fire of wet juniper, his face streaked black, grinning like a fool. Ilse set the key on the stone and sat down beside him. Far below, the cloud swallowed the valley, but the bell at Thal began to ring, slow and steady, because the old ringer had seen the fire and knew they were all still there.