Two black magpies in mid-flight with blue ink splashes, shown on the upper thigh and outer thigh in a watercolour-inspired tattoo on bare skin.

Two magpies in splash style on thighs

Thigh · Mixed · Photo

Two magpies are tattooed on the outer thigh and upper thigh, one with wings spread and one in a mid-flight pose. The birds are rendered in solid black ink with loose, feathered brushwork, while teal and blue splatters and drips surround them. The photograph is taken against a plain black background, which isolates the skin and the artwork.

Thigh Bird Feather Ink splash 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

Dear Nell, the dye works sent a cart round on Tuesday to empty their vats, and the whole beck behind the mill went the colour of a jay's back for a mile. Mrs Fairbairn says the trout are sulking and the vicar has asked whether it's a sign. I told him it's only a sign that the foreman was lazy about the drain.

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Two magpies have taken up residence on the chapel wall since then, bold as bailiffs. Mr Ashby stood under them yesterday and recited the rhyme, one for sorrow, two for joy, and I said it depends whether you count the one you lost. He laughed, then stopped, because his boy is still out in Korea and the last letter came in March. We stood there a while without saying much, which is how men in this town manage grief.

The birds are the worst of it. One flew at the bread I'd put on the sill, wings flung out wide as a fishwife's shawl, and the other hopped in and out of the blue spatter on the cobbles as if it was checking the paint was dry. Every time they lifted off they threw a shadow across the puddle and it looked for a second like the water had grown feathers.

Come home at Whitsun, won't you. Bring the good scissors and the pattern book, and we'll see whether that blue comes out of your good wool the way the foreman promised. Mother sends her love and says to tell you the magpies have already eaten the cat's dinner twice.