Black and grey tattoo of a shaded rose with a stem and leaf, beside fine script reading tale as old as time, on the side of the torso.

Rose and script lettering on the side

Lettering · Ribs · Black and grey · Photo

A shaded rose with a long stem and small leaf sits at the left, with dotted stippling around it. To its right, flowing calligraphic script reads tale as old as time, with thin sketchy swashes beneath the lettering. The work is in black ink and grey shading on pale skin, with a dark garment visible at the top of the frame.

Lettering Botanical Ribs Rose Script Lettering Stem Leaf Dot Swash

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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

The band has been playing the same waltz since eight, and Harold, who runs the cloakroom with a biscuit tin of brass checks, keeps lifting the needle when the fiddler goes flat. You don't mind. You are behind the bar with a bucket of ice and a cardboard box of roses from the market, and every couple who passes asks if they can have one for a lapel or a hair clip. Sixpence each. You keep the thorny ones for yourself.

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Lionel comes in at half past ten with his good coat over one arm and the face of a man sent to fetch a prescription. He buys a rose he doesn't need, then stands at the edge of the floor watching Margaret from the typing pool go round in the arms of a man who sells insurance. He asks whether the song is really as old as he thinks. You tell him everything in this room is older than it looks: the varnish, the chandeliers, the promises people make between one dance and the next.

He leaves the rose on the bar, stem tucked under the rim of a saucer, and never comes back for it. When the lights go up and the last waltz crackles out of the speakers, you pick it up. The petals have begun to curl and brown at the edges. You press it flat between the pages of the order book, beside the Saturday takings, and write the date in pencil across the margin, because somebody ought to keep a record of what was offered and what was left behind.