The Tattooed Poets Project: Mark Nickels

Today's tattoo comes to us from the poet Mark Nickels:


Mark explains:

"This tattoo dates from the end of the Clinton era, I'm thinking 1997, 1998. It can't be true, but getting a tattoo feels like the last unmotivated thing I did. No regrets, I just can't remember exactly what it was all about. You forget about it and then glimpse it in your steamed bathroom mirror and think, Oh. Uh....freedom, or something like that...not so much the word as the feeling, sort of a lovely, aimless, Saturday morning feeling you don't recall having had lately."

If I may interject, I love hearing things like this, because I often ask people about their tattoos, and they dismiss them, "Oh, well, it doesn't mean anything," they often say, as if that somehow makes the tattoo less interesting. However, tattoos often symbolize times, places, memories, or feelings, and Mark is able to capture that perfectly in his explanation of the tattoo.

He continues:

I was interested in medieval stuff at the time, especially medieval and Renaissance music, and found this griffin design in a book of Dover copyright-free medieval motifs. A very good artist at Dare Devil Tattoo drew it freehand for practice, referencing the book, then started on my arm and tattoo'd' it straight off. It hasn't faded much, as you can see. I remember I asked for red and yellow, outlined in black, and that's exactly what she gave me.

Mark Nickels lives in New York City. His book Cicada was published by Rattapallax Press in 2000. He has won the Milton Dorfman Prize (1996), the Ann Stafford Prize from USC (2002) and been a finalist and semi-finalist at Lyric Recovery Festival (Carnegie Hall). He is a 2006 New York State Arts Foundation Fellow in fiction, and two poems from his 2o00 collection were recently selected for inclusion in the on-line archive of the Poetry Foundation (aka Poetry).

Thanks to Mark for sharing his tattoo with us here on Tattoosday! Please be sure to check out one of his poems (one that mentions a griffin, too!) here on BillyBlog!

The Tattooed Poets Project: Adam Deutsch

Although the plan is to introduce new poets in this year's Tattooed Poets Project, there will be a few return visitors from last year. Adam Deutsch is one of those exceptions.

In last year's post, in which Adam shared some incredible Miltonian work, he alluded to the fact that he also had a full sleeve inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson's Transcendental Man. I mean, how could we not bring Adam back to share that?

Here's the sleeve:


A closer look shows the mountains wrapping around the upper arm:


Adam explains more fully:

"That moment where 'the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me' is too important to forget. Rather than have the text tattooed, I went with this image--which is an adaptation of a caricature by Christopher Cranch of the transparent eyeball.

I was moved by the image. Beside Emerson, I was reading the Bhagavad-Gita and Basho. It seemed fitting to have the sky above 'the lover uncontained and immortal beauty' blend into the water at the base of a mountain that peaks at the shoulder.

Like Adam's other work, this piece was done by Sunday Dawne-Marie at Lark Tattoo in Westbury, New York. Adam elaborates on the process:

"We decided that the simple line-art style make it seem less like art on the body, and more like art in the body. The red is a mixture of colors. I had just the red for about 3 years, and went back for the shading in late 2008--everyone would see it peeking out of a sleeve, and they thought I either cut myself, or had a scar from some kind of accident. When I came in and said 'I think we can use some shading. A little depth,' she said, 'That's what I told you 3 years ago.' So, it was two sittings, about 3 hours apiece. Because it's an uncommon style, I booked the last appointment of the day so she could take her time with it. I trust Sunday to no end with ink."

Work from Lark Tattoo has appeared previously on Tattoosday here.

Adam Deutsch was born on Long Island, New York and has his M.A. from Hofstra University (2005) and M.F.A. from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2008). He's been on the editorial staff of a number of presses and journals, including Ninth Letter and Barn Owl Review. He presently works in higher education all over San Diego, and is the editor of Cooper Dillon Books.

Check out a poem from Adam over at BillyBlog here.

The Tattooed Poets Project: Theresa Senato Edwards

We are launching this second volume of the Tattooed Poets Project with Theresa Senato Edwards.

Theresa seemed like the ideal candidate to kick off the month, as she is the devoted editor of Holly Rose Review, a poetry and tattoo literary arts journal.

Theresa has four tattoos, and picked two to share with us here on Tattoosday.

Her first tattoo was this Celtic symbol on the left part of her upper back:
A closer look:


Theresa tells us that this is the:

"Celtic symbol for motherhood, two dots representing my two sons. The goldish dot for Richard, his birthday in November (November birthstone); the red dot for Troy, his birthday in July (July birthstone). I had asked my younger son, Troy, if he thought it would be cool to have his artwork on my skin forever. He did, so he drew it for me, looking at a pic I got off the internet. Tattoo by Mike Calamita, Lasting Impression Tattooing in Hopewell Junction, NY."

My favorite of Theresa's four tattoos was the third one she received, this holly rose:

Theresa explains that this holly rose is

"a holly branch wrapped around a bloomed red/purplish rose with thorned stem.... [and] symbolizes my parents: my dad's birthday was in December; the holly is one of the plants that represents December. My mom's birthday was in June; the rose represents June. They have both been dead for more than 15 years. I had this done in their memory. That's also where the title of Holly Rose Review comes from, although I didn't know that at the time I got the tattoo. Also done by Mike Calamita."

Check out Theresa's poem "Holly Rose," about this tattoo, over at BillyBlog. You can read more of Theresa's work over on her blog here.

Thanks again to Theresa for helping kick off our second annual Tattooed Poets Project!

The Tattooed Poets Project, Volume II

April is National Poetry Month!

Last April, I launched, with the cooperation of poets across the country (and one across the Pond), the "Tattooed Poets Project".

In addition to the "regular" Tattoosday features, every day in April we featured the tattoos of poets. Each post featured poet-contributed photos, with a link back to BillyBlog, where one of their poems was posted on the corresponding day.

Not all the poems were tattoo-related, but many were.

This year, we are resuming the project again, featuring more poets, and a few returning ones.

I enjoyed this adventure last year and am looking forward to another successful April!