Black and white photo of a raised hand with a small black script word tattooed on the inner wrist.

Script lettering on the inner wrist

Lettering · Forearm · Black and grey · Photo

A close photograph of a hand held up with the fingers curled, showing a single word in flowing black script on the inner wrist. The linework is fairly bold and even, with a soft shadow along the strokes. The image is greyscale and the plain light background keeps the focus on the wrist.

Lettering Forearm Script Lettering Word Wrist

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

Dearest Ysolde, the tide has climbed the steps of the Hall of Bells again, and I have been forced to carry the ledgers up to the gallery where the bronze tide-clock hangs. You will laugh at me for keeping accounts in a city that is no longer dry, but the harbour master still expects his tithe of pearls every new moon, and the divers still need paying in something that does not rust.

Keep reading

The old engineers say the great sea-gates will hold until the spring tides, though nobody believes them any more. Last night I walked the lower quay with a lantern and watched the water slide over the carved dolphins as if it had been invited. Fishermen who once sang along these streets now row their boats between the spires and do not look up. I have stopped asking them to.

Our mother's letters are still in the drawer beneath my bed, sealed with green wax. I have not opened them, because she wrote that the city would rise again if we were patient, and I am tired of being patient on her behalf. Instead I have been practising my hand on the backs of old bills of lading, learning the long loops she taught us at the kitchen table.

This morning I found the gate-keeper's pen with the cracked silver nib, and I wrote our city's name in slow, looping script on the inside of my wrist, where the blood runs closest to the skin. Each time I lift my hand to turn the sea-gate key, I will feel it there, and I will know which way home lies, even when the water has taken everything else. Come back before the spring tide, if you can. Your sister, Ilse.