less is more

heaven’s dawn
i find it at the days close
open the skies
be nought to my eyes
but to my soul be all

a permanent stick

A few days ago, a friend of mine had a cross tattooed onto his right shoulder. I have always been aware of the fact that many Christians believe that tattoos are forbidden and thus the irony of a cross tattoo has got me thinking. I have never been pro or anti tattoos. In fact, i believe that external factors, in general, are very poor spiritual yardsticks. As for saying they are wrong... well I can only see one type of Biblical character using a spiritual platform to rebuke the markings on another’s skin. And Jesus’ tanded to rebuke that crowd quite a bit...

Then I got thinking about why I don’t like tattoos if my reason is not spiritual. Well, that’s what I have just very proudly figured out about 5 minutes ago. About a week ago I purchased the Fin24 magazine and inside this edition was a whole bunch of stickers that were pretty funky, so i decided to stick the most funky one on the back of one of my most enjoyed possessions- my moleskine diary. As i was sitting at my desk today, I saw the sticker and decided that I didn’t like it there anymore. So I pulled it off. And you know what happens when you pull a sticker off: half of it stayed on and the part that came off was only half off. The sticky residue was still stuck there. Freak. And that got me thinking all the way back to when I was 4 and knew what a sticker was. I have NEVER stuck a sticker anywhere and liked it for more than one week. In fact, I don’t like stickers. The fun of a sticker is in the peeling and sticking, not in the visual appeal after that.

And that’s why I don’t like tattoos. That’s why I would never got one. It’s a permanent stick.

As for religion? Well I guess we will always have the white-washed tombs with us and they will forever be quoting Leviticus 19:28 and brandishing permanent sticks of their own...