English teacher by day, award winning poet by night.
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Cedars Christian College teacher Peter Ramm is also not a bad boxer.
In fact his award-winning poem Canvas, reflects on his battle with rheumatoid arthritis and his love of boxing.
‘’Initially I wrote the poem for my mother who has battled with the disease along with me, it’s a mixture of the pain and companionship that can come when overcoming obstacles in life,’’ Mr Ramm said.
In winning the Red Room Company’s Poetry Object Competition for 2017, Mr Ramm beat out over 3400 poetry entries from students and teachers across Australia and New Zealand.
He has received $1000 prize money.
The Red Room Company has also employed Oscar-shortlisted animator Robertino Zambrano to transform the three winning poems into animations.
A digital exhibition, in partnership with Val Morgan, will see excerpts from the winning poems, including Mr Ramm’s screened in selected cinemas across Australia from December 21 to January 10, 2018.
The competition was judged by Dr Mark Treddnick who will also be on the panel for one of the most world’s most prestigious poetry prizes, the Montreal International Poetry Prize.
‘’I was quite surprised to win, considering the quality of the poems that are submitted,’’ Mr Ramm said.
‘’It’s a real honour to be judged so highly by poets whom I admire.
‘’I’ve been enjoying writing poetry with our students and sharing in their success, so it’s wonderful to think that my writing could be used to inspire them as well.’’