This is Peregrine’s tattoo of the White Tree of Gondor from The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien.  It was done at About Time Tattoo in Nashua, NH.

(58 votes, average: 4.33 out of 5)

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The meaning of life.

This is Penny’s tattoo from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

(50 votes, average: 4.10 out of 5)

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Bekka explains her tattoo:

My name’s Bekka and my tattoo is from Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

Everybody seems to be obsessed with the quote of “Who is John Galt?” when it felt like, at least to me, the whole question wasn’t the point. I chose instead to use something John Galt says towards the end of the book. To condense the whole philosophy to a single phrase to me would be to say, “You can’t get something from nothing.”

(50 votes, average: 2.46 out of 5)

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This is Aaron’s tattoo.

“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”

- Henry David Thoreau (Walden)

(48 votes, average: 4.50 out of 5)

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This tattoo is on “Busty St. Clair”.

“when the phone rings
I too would like to hear words
that might ease
some of this.”

- Excerpt from Charles Bukowski’s poem 462-0614, in Love is a Dog From Hell.

(47 votes, average: 4.49 out of 5)

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This is Sean’s tattoo.

Broken sky mirror,
blue-shadowed snow,
June is far now,

hold while you can; show
bare of branch
stark of stalk:

ache us to know.

- Winter Vocative by William Bronk

(46 votes, average: 3.39 out of 5)

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This is Vincent’s tattoo.

By a mad miracle I go intact
Among the common rout
Thronging sidewalk, street,
And bickering shops;
Nobody blinks a lid, gapes,
Or cries that this raw flesh
Reeks of the butcher’s cleaver,
Its heart and guts hung hooked
And bloodied as a cow’s split frame
Parceled out by white-jacketed assassins.

- Excerpt from “Street Song” by Sylvia Plath.

(29 votes, average: 3.79 out of 5)

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This is Kate’s tattoo:

I discovered this poem in high school and immediately fell in love with the poem as well as ee cummings’s style. The first two lines have since echoed in my brain as a sort of mantra reminding me to slow down and remember to appreciate the small pleasures in life. Also, the font is OldStyle and took me forever to decide on :) Overall, I am incredibly pleased with the tattoo!

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
whatever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them men are old

may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it’s sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right they are not young

and may myself do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there’s never been quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile

- may my heart always be open to little by e.e. cummings.

(36 votes, average: 4.53 out of 5)

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This is Morgan Karan-Harwin’s tattoo:

The “So It Goes” tattoo was created by my friend Leile and me. The image itself is a triangle consisting of rock, scissors, and paper, representing cycles of success and failure, gain and loss, power and weakness, etc. Nothing is ever absolute.

This was posted as a part of “So it Goes” Saturdays. The phrase “so it goes” appears in Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five 116 times. Can you help me collect 116 “so it goes” tattoos? 14 down, 102 to go.

(38 votes, average: 4.18 out of 5)

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This tattoo belongs to Mathis.

This was posted as a part of “So it Goes” Saturdays. The phrase “so it goes” appears in Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five 116 times. Can you help me collect 116 “so it goes” tattoos? 13 down, 103 to go.

(19 votes, average: 3.53 out of 5)

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