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The photos of the tattoos depicting those two men are side by side in the catalogue, supplied by the two young women who came into the shop together recently to get portrait tattoos of their dead boyfriends.

"Both boyfriends got shot at the same time somewhere on Naylor Road," says Burnette-Bey, a graphic and mural artist who opened her shop on Pennsylvania Avenue SE last November.

She came up with the shop's name herself. Liquidity is a kind of ink. Jones means a strong, compulsive craving. The name works. "Liquidity Jones is her alter ego," says her husband, Michael Bey.

She inked her first tattoos on some kids who worked at the McDonald's down the street. "Then after that," Bey says, "people just started coming in looking for Kris and her talent."

About 10 people a week come to her shop, often bringing with them photocopies of the dead. It's interesting how you can look at a photograph of a person and know that he or she is already dead, like their soul has already seeped out, the image fading even though it is clear.

"People are killed all the time," she says. "But you never hear about them. There is a lack of ritual in our society now. To me, tattooing is spiritual. It's a spiritual way to carry that person with you."

The rotary tattoo machine is still spinning. A constant wailing song.

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Tattooing is an ancient art, and throughout history, different ethnic groups have marked their bodies with ink to celebrate life, death and to honor their gods.

"In Polynesia there is a tradition of taking the ashes of the departed and mixing them in with the ink," says Bob Baxter, editor in chief of Skin & Ink magazine, based in Portland, Ore. "Some artists I know have done that, have mixed cremation ashes with the ink. I'm not talking about two cups. I'm talking about enough in the ink so that it mixes with the ink. The ink is sterile anyway."

Zulu, owner of Zulu Tattoo in Los Angeles, says tattoos have become like lockets, those tiny trinkets of gold or silver hung from thin necklaces that held a portrait or a lock of hair of the dearly departed.

"They want a permanent picture they will never lose," says Zulu, who says he uses only one name. "That ends up being a tattoo."