Mike Displays A Watch for His Son, Thomas

Back in August, I met a guy named Mike outside of the American Indian Museum at Bowling Green in Lower Manhattan. He shared this tattoo with me:

Mike credited this wonderful work to Jimbo Fortier from Horseshoes and Hand Grenades in Chicopee, Massachusetts. Jimbo is his artist of choice, clocking over 125 hours of work from him on a full leg sleeve (when Jimbo was more local to NYC at Lark Tattoo in Westbury on Long Island), and counting!

He explained:

"My son Thomas Michael was born on November 7th at 9:36 in the morning ... so I did an old-fashioned pocket watch, opened up to the time and the day that he was born ... and just as a little commemorative piece, I put his name in what would have been the top of the pocket watch if it's opened."

This tattoo is on the inside of Mike's left forearm.

Thanks to Mike for sharing this cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

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The Tattooed Poets Project: Megan Burns

Our next tattooed poet is Megan Burns, who sent us this beautiful work of body art:

Not only is it a big tattoo, but it's on the ribs, one of the more painful spots to get inked. Megan explains, "It's a pirate ship with the names of my three kids."  She added, "I'm going through a pretty ugly divorce and since I only get my kids half as much as I used to, I wanted to get this piece done."

She credited the work to Terry Brown, one of the owners at Downtown Tattoos in New Orleans.

Megan sent along the following poem to accompany the ship:

Goodnight, Moon

when a woman disappears
it’s a permanent stake
under night, this sky, bodies in a slipping
what you wrote: a secret is a way
of pulling a person apart
pour in like a poison, you feed it
poor excuse, a just score
a domestic failing
pulled force abutting angles
so we dropped a degree of fencing
made adjustments in parallel confines
braided down this writ
this work of medium thumbprints
I put palms to each side of your sweet
face & pretend to be of a gentler nature
absconded, a beauty of break, do you
know what a parade is for?
it’s a way of walking around grief
try to rendezvous this lesser
try not death comes like a desert
you my most thirsty, I was coming along
remember once the children huddle
three a bed where we lullaby
and they ask questions I have no answers
mother is a new “never-was”
if he wants a bed time story
tell him I have no feeling for you

~ ~ ~

Megan Burns is the publisher at Trembling Pillow Press and edits the poetry magazine, Solid Quarter. She has been most recently published in Jacket Magazine, Callaloo, New Laurel Review, Trickhouse, and the Big Bridge New Orleans Anthology. Her poetry and prose reviews have been published in Tarpaulin Sky, Gently Read Lit, Big Bridge, and Rain Taxi. She has two books Memorial + Sight Lines (2008) and Sound and Basin (2013) published by Lavender Ink. She has two recent chapbooks: irrational knowledge (Fell Swoop press, 2012) and a city/ bottle boned (Dancing Girl Press, 2012). Her chapbook Dollbaby was just released from Horse Less Press.

Thanks to Megan for her contribution to the Tattooed Poets Project on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2014 Tattoosday. The poem and tattoo are reprinted with the poet's permission.

If you are reading this on another web site other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.

Kerry's Owl for Gavin (at the NYC Tattoo Convention)

Another one of my favorite tattoos spotted at last weekend's NYC Tattoo Convention was this owl on the thigh of Kerry:

Kerry explained that this owl is for her son, Gavin. It was done by her husband, Kris Geer, who works out of Victorian Ink in Oxford, Massachusetts.

I love how he merges the popular owl motif with the style of sugar skulls.

Thanks to Kerry and Kris for sharing this awesome tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2014 Tattoosday.

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.

Phil Shares a Portrait of His Kids

One of my daughters' teammates on her lacrosse club was immortalized, along with her big brother, on her father's arm:

At the end of the season, I got a chance to chat with Phil, the father of these two kids, about his work. The son was three in the portrait and the daughter was one. Now, they're both teenagers.

He told me that he got this piece almost twelve years ago from a European artist named Zsolt. The artist in question, Zsolt Sárközi, hails from Budapest, Hungary, and works at a shop he founded called Dark Art Tattoo. The tattoo was done here in New York City, at Sacred Tattoo in Manhattan.

Thanks to Phil for sharing this wonderful portrait of his children with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2013 Tattoosday.

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.

A Moment to Pause and Appreciate Our Children

Camille Boivin, right, Philippe Aumond, left, show their tattoos with their son Jacob, in this undated photo. Click to enlarge. 

There's been a lot of negativity in the news, what with the tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut dominating our collective consciousness.

A good friend on Facebook posted Buzzfeed's "26 Moments That Restored Our Faith in Humanity This Year" and #8 caught my attention.

It features two parents who got insulin pumps tattooed on their bellies so that their diabetic child would feel better about his real pump.

Read the whole, heart-warming story here. It's actually dated back in December 2011, but I think it is still important to read life-affirming things when so many of us are focused on tragedy.

Our thoughts and prayers go out, this holiday season, to the families of Newtown, Connecticut.

This entry is ©2012 Tattoosday.

If you are seeing this on another website other than Tattoosday, without attribution, please note that it has been copied without the author's permission and is in violation of copyright laws. Please feel free to visit http://tattoosday.blogspot.com and read our original content. Please let me know if you saw this elsewhere so I contact the webmaster of the offending site and advise them of this violation in their Terms of Use Agreement.