Small black tattoo of a bird with outstretched wings on the side of a finger, against a blurred blue and white tiled background.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Small winged bird on a finger

Hand · Black and grey · Photo

A small tattoo of a bird with spread wings and a rounded head sits across the side of a finger. It is rendered in solid black ink with simple, bold shapes and little shading. The background is out of focus, showing a blue and white patterned surface.

Hand Bird Wing

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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 closer, the wind off the harbour takes half of what I say. You want the bird, the small black one that came down the hill with the cart? Then listen properly, because my mother gave it to me straight and I'll give it to you the same. In Santa Vitória there was a tile painter called Anselmo who worked in blue on white, flowers mostly, because the church wanted flowers. He hated flowers. Every Sunday he slipped one bird into the corner of a tile, a thing with spread wings and a round head like a closed fist, and every Monday the priest had it scraped off the wall.

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The year the Atlantic came up over the mole, nine boats were still out past the lighthouse. The women stood on the quay with their shawls tied under their chins and could see nothing but spray and the lamp turning. Anselmo's daughter Rosalina ran to the kitchen where her father had fixed one tile above the hearth, the only one he had never let the priest touch. Ink, not blue. A bird with its wings opened as wide as the tile would allow. She held the lamp against it and carried the lamp to the top of the wall, and the men, looking for anything that wasn't water, saw a black shape pinned to the dark and steered for it.

Nine boats came in. Eight came in by the lamp and one by the bird, because old Tomé swore he saw its wings move, and nobody argued with Tomé about anything after that. The priest asked for the tile to be taken down for the church. Rosalina said yes, and then she said the wall was the only place a bird could be seen from the sea, and so it stayed where it was.

That tile is still above the hearth. The ink has gone the colour of weak tea and the wind comes through the shutter straight onto it. Some evenings, when the boats are in and the harbour is quiet, my mother used to lift me up so I could press my thumb to one wing. Go on. Mind the edge, it's sharp where the glaze cracked.