The Tattooed Poets Project: Nescher Pyscher

Today's tattooed poet is named Nescher Pyscher and hails from Cambridge, Ohio.

Nescher offered  up his right wrist for us here at Tattoosday:

Photo courtesy of Nescher Pyscher

Nescher explains:

"The tattoo was done in two parts. The first part was my wife's name in Chinese, surrounded by an infinity symbol. It was my wedding present for her. I designed the tattoo myself, and I was inspired to do so by a ink-stamper-thing-y my wife's father brought home for her from China. The second part, my son's name, was my wife's Christmas present to me when our son was born. I do not remember the name of the tattoo studios or the artists, but both tats were procured in the Akron, Ohio area."

As a matter of clarification, I asked Nescher about the kanji representing his wife's name. He told me that the "three symbols mean--so I've been told--'Mother,' 'Earth' and 'Love.' " He added that she is a geologist, by occupation.

Photo courtesy of Nescher Pyscher

As for his son's name, Geir, he clarified that his name means Spear, which is Icelandic or Norwegian, in origin. Nescher added that "names with value and freighted with meaning are important in my family. He is the strong weapon in my right hand, the spear we cast into the future."

As for a poem, Nescher, offered up this piece:

dustbitten

i plant the seed of myself within myself--

mutated, cloned, half-life-whole that

gropes toward darkening life--

and watch the poisoned weed of me grow.

i am the frozen feathers of a bird in flight,

locked to dead tree, dying in estrous,

decayed in birth, and forgotten before the wind

could sweep through feathers.

i am eye,

i am face,

i am ear

i am the frozen corpse at the bottom of the well

leaking into life; oozing into being;

draining into dream and desire

i am fist

i am nail

i am bent, broken finger

i water the tumors of me with the salt of my tears

the iron tang of my blood,

the sweet toxin of my urine.

i am teeth

i am tongue

i am busily working lips

i eat my flesh, taken straight from crippled vine

and wince at the taste of my self-inflicted pain,

juices running unchecked down my pocked and hairless

chin

i am blister

i am burn

i am wounded, weeping sore

my madness drives me, sings inside me

and keeps me warm

the feel of meeting teeth on my broken skin feels

like warm rain in the evening;  

sun setting on life forever

i am stone

i am flesh

i am dust

 ~ ~ ~

Nescher Pyscher--his real name. Honest!--is a happily married, thirty-five year old author and poet living, writing and staying at home with his son in the Cambridge, Ohio area. His writing can be found at Weebly.com, Helium.com, Pablo Lennis, and his book of short stories, Itchy Whispers, is now available from Trafford or Amazon.com. His adventures in ineptitude with his son, The Pants, can be read twice weekly at The Daily Jeffersonian.  

Thanks to Nescher for sharing his tattoos and his poetry with us here on Tattoosday!

This entry is ©2011 Tattoosday. The poem is reprinted here with the permission of the author.

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Tattoosday Goes To Hawai'i - All in the Family, Part 5 (Ulu's Amazing Plumage)

In January 2008, when Tattoosday was a mere infant blog, my mother sent me photos of some of the ink my cousins possessed.

I already shared Keali'i's sleeves here, but included in that email from Mom was this astonishing piece from his kid sister, my niece, Ulu:

Photo by Diane Scrafton Cohen Ferreira

I reached out to Ulu (which is a shortened version of her middle name, Uluwehi, which is abbreviated from her full middle name, Kamali'iwahineuluwehi) and we exchanged messages, but we never connected to discuss the tattoo. Then, last month, I was in Hawai'i, at the home of Ulu and her husband Travis.

For the record, despite my inkspotting ways, I was never sure if I'd have the opportunity on this trip to document all my nieces' and nephews' ink. I knew I'd be seeing them, but my purpose for doing so was not tattoo-related.

But as you may have read over the last week, there I was at Ulu and Travis's place, hanging out with family, and the subject turned inky, and out came the camera.

Still, I wasn't sure I would be seeing the tattoo from my mom's photo - Ulu was wearing a dress and I'm always walking on eggshells when it comes to lower back tattoos. But I was taking pictures of everyone else's tattoos and Ulu's back piece was mentioned. She happily changed into sweats so I could take a closer look at this amazing peacock feather tattoo:

One of the things I had always wondered was how far around the feather went. I got my answer soon enough:

As you can see the tattoo dips gracefully down after it rounds the hip. I'm glad I got to see this side because I was able to capture the detail in the color and the tiny pink butterfly near the tip of the quill:

Ulu got this, aside from the beauty of it, to cover up a "tramp stamp" [her words, not mine - no angry comments, please]. The original piece is covered by the eye of the peacock feather.

The artist responsible for this incredible tattoo is Libra, who freelances in Hawai'i, but occasionally does guest spots at 808 Tattoo, and was at East Side Tattoo Studio at the time this was done.

In that original email from Grandma Diane (my mom), she also included the tattoos of Travis, Ulu's husband.

I had never met Travis before, but was welcomed by him as one of the family. I took my own photo of the forearm ink he wears, also by Libra, in honor of his and Ulu's children, Ezra and Trinity.

My deepest and most sincere thanks to both Travis and Ulu, not only for their hospitality and kindness, but for sharing their tattoos with us here on Tattoosday.

This concludes the "All in the Family" subset of the Tattoosday Goes to Hawai'i series. A warm mahalo to all of my nieces and nephews for letting their mainland uncle help share their tattoos with the Tattoosday community.

Previously in the Tattoosday Goes to Hawai'i - All in the Family series:

Part 1, A Preface
Part 2, Keali'i's Sleeves
Part 3, Ikaika, In Progress
Part 4, Lehua's Eternal Tribute to Poppa John