The Gift a Poem campaign, an initiative of the Zbigniew Herbert Foundation and the Polish National Commission for UNESCO, has become a permanent form of celebrating the World Poetry Day by UNESCO Associated Schools Network in many corners of the world.
We believe that our campaign – based on the simple idea of a poem offered to another person as a gift that carries words of spiritual support, consolation, hope and peace – is very much relevant at a time of war, evil, and selfishness we witness in so many places around the world.
The third edition of the campaign, in 2025, was organized by member schools in 18 countries, including six that have carried it out for the first time: the Dominican Republic, Iraq, Lebanon, Montenegro, Tunisia, and the United Arab Emirates.
Since the first edition of the Gift a Poem campaign three years ago we received beautiful and moving reports from 32 countries on four continents (see the map). We have reason to believe that more countries took part in our initiative but haven’t shared their reports with us. We encourage them to do so.
We are pleased that schools from 9 countries have joined all three editions of the Gift a Poem campaign, thus further supporting our initiative of celebrating the World Poetry Day together with the ASPnet community.
The Gift a Poem campaign was inspired by Polish writer Zbigniew Herbert (1924-1998), one of the greatest poets of the 20th century who wrote Poem Letters to friends, artists important to him, and to people he valued. Some of these letters were later included in the poet’s books and number among his most insightful and moving works. The writer’s gesture of giving someone a handwritten poem inspired the Gift a Poem campaign.
We would like to invite you to read this year’s national reports, but also those from previous years.
We encourage and invite you to participate in future editions of this beautiful campaign.