COP30 poems celebrating Planet Earth released by Space Park Leicester
Zahra Kazimi won the under-11 age category with her poem Our Wonderful World.
A collection of moving poems inspired by this year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference COP30 has been published by Space Park Leicester.
The University of Leicester’s £100 million space research and innovation hub joined forces with the National Centre for Earth Observation to urge budding poets to enter the ‘There is no Planet B’ poetry competition ahead of COP30 which took place in Brazil last month.
Zahra Kazimi won the under-11 age category with her poem ‘Our Wonderful World’, Lucie Edwards won the 11-16 category with ‘There is no Planet B’ and Ankita Pant won the over-16 category with ‘The planet whispering through time’.
An e-book featuring the winning poems – alongside more than 20 other highly commended submissions and stunning images of the Earth – has now been released and printed copies of the collection will also be available from Space Park Leicester from Monday, December 22.
Space Park Leicester Education and Outreach Officer Josh Barker said: “As the world prepared for the 30th UN Climate Change Conference we marked the occasion by inviting people to write a poem exploring the theme of ‘There is no Planet B’.
“The poetry competition celebrated creativity and raised awareness about climate action and our shared responsibility to look after planet Earth.
“It was wonderful to read entries from a range of poets of all ages who explored the complexity of the climate or focussed on what makes Earth so special.
“All the poems were very moving and highlighted humanity’s impact on the Earth and the challenges it is facing.”
Last month, under-11 category winner Zahra Kazimi read her poem at Space Park Leicester during a special COP30 celebration event.
Zahra’s teacher Emily Woodall, who attended the celebration, said: “Zahra had an incredible time, and it was so lovely for her, her family and myself to experience. The event was brilliantly organised and the talks were fantastic as well as the demonstrations, performances and information.”