Three roses and a butterfly on a lower leg
Realism · Calf · Black and grey · Photo
Three shaded roses are stacked down the lower leg, joined by fine black swirling vines, with a butterfly with detailed wings at the top. The roses use soft grey shading and smooth gradients, while the vines and butterfly outline are drawn in crisp, thin black linework. The tattoo is shown in black and grey against a plain leg, a bright clinic background and a clear plastic-covered surface.
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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction
Dear Ilse,
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The customs officer at Venlo took the whole box apart, leaf by leaf, then held the three rooted cuttings up to the light as if checking them for forgery. I told him they were the last Albertine stems from Mother's wall, and that the butterfly which came to them every June had never once asked for a passport. He did not laugh. He stamped the form instead and wrote 'roses, grey, three' in the margin, which is more than the Dutch bureaucracy has ever done for me.
I have been practising grafts on the flat stones behind the petrol station, because the frontier cafe will not let me use its kitchen table for the knife work. The stems take best when the sap is high and the wind comes from the west, Father always said, and the west has been kind all week. Three vines, one above the other, the way we trained them up the side of the barn. The top one has already put out a green curl that looks, if you squint, like the tail of a swallowtail.
Come to the crossing on Sunday. Bring the tin with the old secateurs. I will wait on the bench where the lorries turn, and when you see the grey of the roses through the fence, you will know the rest of the garden came across with me.
Love, Tomas
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