The second exhibit, hosted by the CVF and the Vulnerable Twenty (V20) Group of Ministers of Finance, was launched on November 11 with the title “The Making and Unmaking of Places: Stories of Loss, Resilience and Restoration Using Poetry and Art.”

“Science and policymaking are essential to the climate change [movement]. But science and policymaking are also insufficient. We need more of the humanities. We need more of the arts. What we’re doing today is nothing less than calling for a global poetry rebellion so that the public has more ways to contribute, to link arms, and to hold hands to drive world leaders to do what they have to do,” Renato Redentor Constantino, CVF-V20 Advisor and Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities Executive Director, said as he thanked the Climate Reality branches of Africa, Canada, and the Philippines for the support of Poets for Climate to the When Is Now campaign.

Launched in July this year, Poets for Climate has conducted five (5) virtual Pebble Poem Workshops and has generated more than 100 poems for When Is Now from around 75 youth leaders, climate advocates, and poets from Cameroon, Canada, Kenya, Nigeria, Philippines, Sierra Leone, South Africa, and Zambia. It has also unveiled murals in the cities of Johannesburg in South Africa, Montreal in Canada, and Iloilo and Isabela in the Philippines.

Bridging the gap between the Global North and the Global South

“In engaging in these [Pebble Poem] Workshops with the Philippines and Canada Branches, it was a privilege and an experience of a lifetime bringing Climate Reality Leaders and activists together,” Amy Giliam-Thorp, African Climate Reality Project Branch Manager, said.

“What we realize is that the power of the When Is Now campaign lies in its use of climartivism (climate, arts, and activism). That powerful combination of arts, poetry, and activism enabled people to showcase and tell their stories, their lived experiences, as a way of creating meaningful spaces that bring more people into the conversation,” she added.

The Poets for Climate roadshow at COP27 aims to create connections and solidarity between the Global North and Global South by integrating stories of loss, damage, and resilience into policymaking and decision-making spaces.

“Canada is an economy that relies so extensively on fossil fuels while also exploiting people around the planet, as well as indigenous people [in Canada]. We have this history and we have the responsibility,” said Andre-Yanne Parent, Climate Reality Canada Branch Manager, during the CVF-V20 event.

“[Through Poets for Climate], we are able to give a space for Canadian Climate Reality Leaders to connect and build relationships so that they could come from a place of empathy, compassion, and understanding of other people’s reality and also understand what they share in common,” Parent added.

Noting that the COP27 roadshow is just the beginning, Parent announced during the CVF-V20 event that Poets For Climate will also be at the  15th  Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the Convention on Biological Diversity happening in Canada in December. A series of light projections featuring  Poets For Climate poems across Montreal and Canada are in the works to demand urgent action from world leaders and decision-makers.