Pay with a poem: cafes around the world to exchange coffee for poetry

To mark World Poetry Day, more than a thousand coffee establishments around the world will use poetry as their currency this Saturday

• Find out about the participating cafes in your area here
  

What is a poem worth? As authors around the world despair of making a living, a company based in Vienna has finally come up with a definitive answer: one cup of coffee.

Julius Meinl, a coffee-roasting company founded in 1862, is marking Unesco’s World Poetry Day with a promotion in 1,100 cafes, bars and restaurants across 23 countries mostly in continental Europe but including the UK, the US and Australia, offering a dose of caffeine to any customer who hands over one of their own poems.