Four side-by-side views of a black and grey tattoo on an upper arm, showing a raised fist with radiating lines, banknotes, swirling smoke and a star.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Raised fist with rays and banknotes on upper arm

Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

The tattoo shows a raised clenched fist with short radiating lines above it, with banknotes fanned out on one side and wispy smoke or flame curling below. A star appears in the right-hand panels. The image is composed as four adjacent views of the same arm, so the design is repeated across the frame.

Upper arm Fist Ray Banknote Money Smoke Flame Star

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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 down, sit down, you at the back, and mind the pram. I'll tell it once and I'll tell it straight, because Alfie Crane is still alive and he'll deny every word when he's sober.

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Harry Doyle was the strongman at Pemberton's Travelling Marvels the summer the generator caught fire behind the big top. Everyone else ran. Harry walked into the smoke with his shirt over his mouth and came back dragging the Dutch tent-pegger out by his braces, both of them coughing like old carpets. Pemberton paid him in a fold of notes thick as a hymnal, and Harry was so pleased he held his fist up to the sun as if he'd won the cup at Wembley. The fairground boys cheered, and the little ones took up the chant.

But a fist raised in a field is only a fist until somebody else wants what's in it. That night Alfie Crane, who ran the shooting gallery and owed Pemberton more than rent, came to the caravan with a bottle and a grievance. They played cards by the light of the tin star Pemberton hung on the Ferris wheel each evening so the drunk farmers could find the gate. Harry lost the first hand, won the second, then lost his temper and his notes all at once.

Alfie walked off with the lot. Harry stood in the mud with his hand still raised, smoke from the dying fire curling round his wrist as if it had opinions. Some winters later Alfie's gallery went up in a paraffin fire, and the notes he'd won blew across the car park like a flock of startled moths. Harry stood at the gate with his fist up, the way he always did, and the star on the wheel swung round to light him. Now, who wants a go on the coconut shy?