Colour neo-traditional tattoo of a large red and orange feather with bold black outlines on a forearm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Red feather on a forearm

Neo-trad · Forearm · Colour · Photo

A large feather runs diagonally across the forearm, with its quill and barbs drawn in bold black outlines. The feathers are shaded in deep red, crimson, orange and pink, with darker tones along the lower edges to suggest depth. Part of another tattoo, a cloud with a striped band, is visible at the top edge, and the arm rests on white paper towel.

Neo-trad Forearm Feather Cloud

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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

Dear Tom, the rain has finally stopped, though the slag heap still smokes at the back of the chapel field and the washing comes in grey whatever we do. Mam says to tell you the hens have stopped laying since the frost, and that Mrs Oakley's boy went down the shaft on Monday with a new lamp and came back up without his cap. Nobody is saying much about it.

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I went up the bank yesterday to look for the red kite that used to nest in the ash trees above the old engine house. I did not see it. What I found instead was a feather, caught on the wire fence, as long as my forearm and the colour of a coal fire when you blow on it. The quill was black and clean. I brought it home in my apron pocket and have it on the windowsill now, where the light comes through the orange barbs and makes them look lit from inside.

Here is the odd part. When the wind gets up at night the feather lifts on its one nail and taps the glass, and I lie awake counting the taps the way Dad used to count the cage bells. Three taps means the cage is coming up. I have started listening for it, which is foolish, because nothing comes up from the workings but water and men who will not talk.

Write back soon and tell me the sea is kinder than the coal. If you find another feather on the quay, keep it for me. I will know it is yours by the way it holds the light.