Mobile Photography & Art Saturday Poetry – ‘I hope to God you will not ask’ by Esther Belin with M. Cecilia Sao Thiago
This weeks Saturday Poetry, matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘I hope to God you will not ask’ by Esther Belin. She explains, “this poem is an anagram poem using a phrase taken from Navajo headman, Barboncito, in his speech to General Sherman on May 28, 1868. As a citizen of the Navajo Nation, I am grateful to our leaders who had courage and vision to express our innate connection to our homeland, Diné bikéyah. This poem was inspired by the work of Terrance Hayes and his wonderful craft of anagram poetry.”
Belin is the author two poetry collections, including Of Cartography (University of Arizona Press, 2017), and From the Belly of My Beauty (University of Arizona Press, 2000), winner of the 2000 American Book Award. She is a Navajo Nation citizen and lives in southwest Colorado.
I have matched this image entitled ‘We march backwards into the future’ by @klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago with this poem.
You can view and follow her work on Instagram here.
If you would like to be featured in our Saturday Poetry section, please ensure you include the hashtag #theappwhisperer to any images posted to Instagram. This will mean we will be able to consider it.
To view the others we have published in this section, go here.
‘I hope to God you will not ask’ ©Esther Belin
I hope to God you will not ask me to go anywhere except my own country. If we go back, we will follow whatever orders you give us. We do not want to go right or left, but straight back to our own land.
—Barboncito
I hope to God you will not ask
Me or my People to send
Postcard greetings: lamented wind
Of perfect sunrisings, golden
Yes, we may share the same sun setting
But the in-between hours are hollow
The People fill the void with prayers for help
Calling upon the Holy Ones
Those petitions penetrate and loosen
The binds you tried to tighten
Around our heart, a tension
Blocking the wind, like a shell
Fluttering inside, fluttering inside
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Joanne Carter
Joanne Carter, creator of the world’s most popular mobile photography and art website— TheAppWhisperer.com— TheAppWhisperer platform has been a pivotal cyberspace for mobile artists of all abilities to learn about, to explore, to celebrate and to share mobile artworks. Joanne’s compassion, inclusivity, and humility are hallmarks in all that she does, and is particularly evident in the platform she has built. In her words, “We all have the potential to remove ourselves from the centre of any circle and to expand a sphere of compassion outward; to include everyone interested in mobile art, ensuring every artist is within reach”, she has said. Promotion of mobile artists and the art form as a primary medium in today’s art world, has become her life’s focus. She has presented lectures bolstering mobile artists and their art from as far away as the Museum of Art in Seoul, South Korea to closer to her home in the UK at Focus on Imaging. Her experience as a jurist for mobile art competitions includes: Portugal, Canada, US, S Korea, UK and Italy. And her travels pioneering the breadth of mobile art includes key events in: Frankfurt, Naples, Amalfi Coast, Paris, Brazil, London. Pioneering the world’s first mobile art online gallery - TheAppWhispererPrintSales.com has extended her reach even further, shipping from London, UK to clients in the US, Europe and The Far East to a global group of collectors looking for exclusive art to hang in their homes and offices. The online gallery specialises in prints for discerning collectors of unique, previously unseen signed limited edition art. Her journey towards becoming The App Whisperer, includes (but is not limited to) working for a paparazzi photo agency for several years and as a deputy editor for a photo print magazine. Her own freelance photographic journalistic work is also widely acclaimed. She has been published extensively both within the UK and the US in national and international titles. These include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Popular Photography & Imaging, dpreview, NikonPro, Which? and more recently with the BBC as a Contributor, Columnist at Vogue Italia and Contributing Editor at LensCulture. Her professional photography has also been widely exhibited throughout Europe, including Italy, Portugal and the UK. She is currently writing several books, all related to mobile art and is always open to requests for new commissions for either writing or photography projects or a combination of both. Please contact her at: [email protected]
