Supporting poetry–carved in bamboo

Here’s a great illustration of what we’re trying to do, and why we’re trying to do it.
This extraordinary writing in the photo above, inscribed by hand in bamboo, is from the Mangyan people of the Philippines, and it is an ambahan, their own remarkable form of poetry.
Both the poetry itself and the script in which it is written are highly endangered. Luckily, the Mangyan Heritage Center is dedicated to discovering, identifying, preserving, publishing and teaching them–in this instance in a gorgeous hardbound volume entitled Bamboo Whispers.
Ambahans are a little like haiku, capturing a moment in everyday life that glistens with meaning. Here’s one about lost love:

Says the bee despondently
if the place was not burned down
I would have built my house there.

And another:

Look at the fish in the creek
full of joy, and mirth, and cheer.
Fine is the sand, white and clear!

I’m lucky enough to own a copy of Bamboo Whispers, but I’m putting it up as a reward for our Kickstarter campaign.
I’m also going to use the Mangyan script, sharp and angular as you’d expect of a script incised in bamboo, for one of the sudoku in our book–if this campaign reaches its goal and we can publish it.
So: if we can get to $5,000 in pledges toward our goal by the end of the day, we’ll be in fair shape. If we can’t, this campaign will be increasingly uphill.
Please visit https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/endangeredatlas/endangered-alphabets-sudoku to support us, and through us, to support the work of indigenous and minority artists and writers the world over.
Thanks.
Tim

This post is sponsored by our friends at Typotheque, Rosetta, and Solidarity of Unbridled Labour.