Jesse Burch's Back o' Birds

This week we're featuring tattoos on alumni from Occidental College, in honor of homecoming and family weekend, and we'll start with this amazing set of tattoos on the back of Jesse Burch, Class of 1992:

Jesse told me that the center shape was done about six years ago, but the birds were tattooed earlier this year. All of the work is by Jeremy Swan (@mister_swan) at Broken Art Tattoo (@broken_art_tattoo) in Silver Lake, Los Angeles.

When I asked Jesse about the origins of the work, he replied:

"Well, the center thing is an old design by my friend Bill Dawson. Its meaning is secret. 

The birds each represent parts of me. The Western mockingbird on my right shoulder is perched on a palo verde branch. Both are native to the west, like me, and the mockingbird represents my interest in imitation and my chameleonic nature. The left shoulder has the skylark on English oak. That’s my anglophilia in a nutshell.

I bought both bird images on eBay. They’re from vintage bird prints — another thing I like: old shit.

I like them a ton, despite being somewhat atypical, I guess. But then, I reckon I am too. 

I will say that it was weird to go from being a person with a tattoo to being a 'tattooed person' overnight. Took some getting used to. And, of course, now I want more....

Also, I meant for the whole thing together to look kind of like a coat of arms. But I think the middle piece needs updating."

I've known Jesse since 1988, when he matriculated as a first year student at Occidental. I was one of his resident advisers. Jesse is a working actor in Los Angeles (see his credits here) and he also hosts a web show on YouTube called "You're Better Than Me." The episode below is his interview with Jeremy, his tattoo artist:

Thanks to Jesse for sharing his awesome tattoos with us here on Tattoosday's Occidental Week!

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The Tattooed Poets Project: Leigh Ann Hornfeldt

Our next tattooed poet is Leigh Ann Hornfeldt, who sent us two tattoos. First, this Northern mockingbird:

Leigh Ann explains:

"I chose this tattoo as I was writing my first collection of poems, East Main Aviary. During this time I became very interested in birding. I can remember the first mockingbird I ever saw: He was walking the rail of our wooden deck during a light rain. From that point on it seemed like mockingbirds were everywhere for me, with one even following me around the inside of a home improvement store. I believe in animal guides and mockingbirds remind me of the power of my voice, to protect my nest, and to always be brave. This tattoo was done by a dear friend, Kevin Hamilton of Bleed Blue Tattoo [in Lexington, Kentucky]."

Her second tattoo was part of the Lexington Tattoo Project, which was referenced in yesterday's post from Bianca Spriggs.

Leigh Ann elaborates:

"This tattoo was part of The Lexington Tattoo Project by Kremena Todorova & Kurt Gohde. A local poet (Bianca Spriggs) wrote a poem for Lexington and over 253 residents of the city had a word or phrase from the tattoo inked on their body. I was lucky to choose the phrase 'they'd have enough' which came at a time when my husband and I were simplifying our lives through purging possessions and focusing on more time with each other and our children. For me this phrase says it all: if we have one another, we have enough. This tattoo was done by Charmed Life Tattoo." 

Leigh Ann sent us this poem, as well, which was first published in Spry Literary Journal:

Strays

i.

Let’s call him something she said
bent over the veranda, breeze
lifting the silk baby-doll
nightgown above her ass.
He sees all he wants now and then.
The steel in her jawline, the fractured
lily nestled under her panties.
We’ll just call him something, anything really —
you can’t name a thing you’re gonna leave
she said and he agreed and the palm trees
nodded their heads and that night they made love
on rough cotton sheets while the cat tightroped
the deck’s banister and the ocean worried
at the door’s wooden slats. Morning she let him
in again. Took the little loaf of his body
to her chest and breathed in that smell,
that island smell she could never name
even though she knew all the right words.

ii.

This one’s paws craved necks,
    warmth of jugular, vulnerable pulse.
This one came and went as she pleased,
    afternoons bawled till she bloomed herself
inside out. How could anyone say no to this one?
    A tortie, a mink coiled around anonymous shoulders,
a needy biscuit-kneader, claws searching for a warm tit.

iii.

Oh, she loved him.
She loved him, his face
gouged like the bottom
of a cast iron skillet. She loved
him. Pigeon-toed slink, low bee-hive
growl. She loved him. Litters
of crying kittens all over
the neighborhood. Vagabond.
No good drifter. She
loved him. Half-an ear missing
kind of love. Born out of pity.
I won’t leave you
no matter what you do
desperate kind that keeps
a woman in dark glasses
even at night, the kind
that makes a woman go
weak, weaker, weaker, gone.

iv.

Swore she wouldn’t keep him.
Each night tip-toed cold
stone to driveway’s edge,
packaged pink salmon in hand
Here, kitty, kitty
His soupy mew
from the storm drain,
her hands wringing themselves
dry, the sky’s pursed lips
and the dogs whining, always
whining through the window cracks,
eyes rolling in their thick, meaty skulls.

~ ~ ~

Leigh Anne Hornfeldt, a Kentucky native, is the author of East Main Aviary (Flutter Press, 2012) & The Intimacy Archive (ELJ Publications, 2013) and the editor at Two of Cups Press. She is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee, as well as the recipient of a grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women. In 2013 her poem “Laika” placed 2nd in the Argos Prize competition (Dorianne Laux, judge) and in 2012 she received the Kudzu Prize in Poetry. Her work has appeared in journals such as Spry, Lunch Ticket, Foundling Review, and The Journal of Kentucky Studies.

Thanks to Leigh Ann for contributing her poem and tattoos to the Tattooed Poets Project on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2014 Tattoosday. The poem and tattoos 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.

Tova's Mockingbird Takes Wing

Late last month, I met Tova at my local Borders store. She was sporting this incredible tattoo on her upper left arm:

When she told me she had it recently inked at New York Adorned, I guessed correctly that Virginia Elwood had been the artist. Virginia in incredibly talented, and seems to especially excel at bird tattoos (her work has been seen previously on Tattoosday here, here and here).

Tova explained that she loves birds, and that this mockingbird reflects a turn of events that occurred in Southern California. She described to me how, the night before she had to take defend  her Ph.D. exams dissertation, her husband had a guest staying with them, and this individual seemed particular insensitive to the momentous occasion Tova was facing the next day, as he was playing loud music well into the night.

Tova recalled how her anxiety and displeasure over this guest’s inconsiderate activity forced her from her home in search of a little peace and quiet. As she circled her block, she was struck by the large number of mockingbirds that were flying around.

She successfully passed her exams defended her dissertation and associates the mockingbird with this landmark event in her life.

As her Ph.D. Is in English, I asked her if she was familiar with one of my favorite poems, Charles Bukowski’s “The Mockingbird”. She wasn’t, so I suggested she check it out and I thought it appropriate to share here:

the mockingbird

the mockingbird had been following the cat
all summer
mocking mocking mocking
teasing and cocksure;
the cat crawled under rockers on porches
tail flashing
and said something angry to the mockingbird
which I didn't understand.

yesterday the cat walked calmly up the driveway
with the mockingbird alive in its mouth,
wings fanned, beautiful wings fanned and flopping,
feathers parted like a woman's legs,
and the bird was no longer mocking,
it was asking, it was praying
but the cat
striding down through centuries
would not listen.

I saw it crawl under a yellow car
with the bird
to bargain it to another place.

summer was over.

 ~

Thanks to Tova for sharing her stunning tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is Copyright ©2011 by Tattoosday, with the exception of "The Mockingbird," which is Copyright ©1972 by Charles Bukowski.

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.