Black tribal swirl tattoo with spirals and curling tendrils, placed centrally on the lower back above the waistband of blue jeans.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Tribal swirl tattoo on the lower back

Back · Black and grey · Photo

A symmetrical black tattoo of a tribal-style design sits centrally on the lower back. It is built from bold spirals and curling tendrils that radiate outwards from a central knot. The solid black ink sits against lightly tanned skin above the waistband of blue denim jeans.

Back Tribal Swirl Spiral Tendril Symmetrical design

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

The ovens on Harrow Lane light themselves at four, and by the time you have the flour scaled, the street is still black beyond the shutter. Your father used to say the dough tells you what it needs if you stop talking long enough to listen. You have never stopped talking long enough. This morning you try.

Keep reading

Nell Okonedo comes in at quarter past with a cold coming on and a sheet of pastry folded in her apron pocket, which she unfolds on the bench like a map. All winter she has practised a cinnamon whorl: she rolls the dough into a long tongue, then coils it inward from both ends so the two spirals meet at a knot in the middle and send tendrils off in every direction. Her first three came out lopsided. You watch her fourth go on the tray and say nothing, because the fourth is right.

The bread takes its time. You wipe down the steel, count the trays, and step out back where the yard smells of wet stone and diesel. When you come in, the window is greying and the room has the warm, sweet smell that means the ovens have done their work. Nell stands by the racks with her hands on her hips, studying her tray the way you once studied your own first loaf.

Your father's rule was never to correct a whorl that came out true. You drape a tea towel over the knot to keep the heat in and slide the tray along the bench until it sits square beside yours. Outside, the first van pulls up with its hazards blinking. Nell laughs, a little hoarse, and asks what you'll tell the customers. You tell her the truth: the dough has finally stopped arguing with her.