Fine line black tattoo of a swallow in flight on a woman's shoulder near the collarbone, with a dark top and dark hair visible.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Small swallow on a shoulder

Fine line · Shoulder · Black and grey · Photo

A small swallow in flight is tattooed on the upper shoulder, angled diagonally with its wings raised and tail forked. The linework is thin and sketchy, with light shading along the wings and body in black ink. The bird sits in the lower half of the frame against smooth skin, with a dark patterned top and loose hair at the edges.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Wilf,

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The pair under the canopy at Carrbridge Junction have finally settled on the iron bracket above the ticket hatch, the one you painted green the summer before you left. The stationmaster swears they are the same birds that came every year when Dad was signalman, and I have stopped arguing with him. Yesterday one of them dropped a feather onto the 14.12 to Inverness and the guard picked it up and handed it to me like a telegram.

I have been thinking about how they fly. Nobody tells you a swallow hardly ever lands on the ground if it can help it. They drink while skimming the cut at the goods yard, they catch flies over the sidings, and they sleep on the wing when the weather is kind. Mrs Ferris from the buffet says that is why sailors trusted them, that a bird which never sets foot on land must know where the coast is.

The last train tonight is the milk tanker for Thurso, and I have to be on the platform to sign for the seals. I will watch them go up under the lamp, the forked tails opening like a pair of scissors, and I will count them in and count them out. You said once that you would come back when the birds did. They are back, Wilf. Your bracket is holding.

Love, Nell

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