Mr Ramm won the Manchester Poetry Prize at the Manchester Writing Competition, the UK's biggest awards for unpublished writing.

Having travelled to Manchester to attend the winners' ceremony on Thursday, May 26, Mr Ramm is already back at work trying to balance his life as a poet, teacher and father.

"It was quite a surprise for me to win because of how great I thought the other poets were," Mr Ramm said.

"It's quite a thrill to think that somebody across the other side of the world saw something in a poem that's based in Robertson in the Southern Highlands."

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Mr Ramm received a call to say he had made the final six out of 1500 entrants in the middle of May, after entering the competition in January.

He submitted a collection of three poems titled "Landfall" which tackle themes including the environment and fatherhood.

"I'm a father of a couple of young boys so the poems often run into themes of fathering, life and the legacy we're leaving our children," Mr Ramm said.

"[The poems] are coloured with the landscape of the Highlands and out towards Goulburn and Eden Monaro, even the South Coast as well because I work in the lower Illawarra and I holiday down in Jervis Bay."

Mr Ramm said he had gathered strong imagery from the Robertson Rainforest during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

"If you know Robertson, there's a little patch of rainforest on the edge of town which is being protected and looked after by the local conservation group," he said.

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"I would take my five-year-old for walks there, and we'd grab some hot chips from Elwrays and go and sit in the rainforest for a bit.

"A walk in nature can be quite refreshing from the burdens of what we were experiencing during the lockdowns and then also as a parent, the joy of children often contrasts with the worries of adulthood, so that poem crosses a few of those sorts of themes."

The Manchester Writing Competition is one of the largest international writing competitions and winners receive £10,000, or around AUD 17,500, in prize money.

With poems taking Mr Ramm up to six months to write, he said he would be spending the money on his family to thank them for their patience during his years of writing.

Mr Ramm previously won the South Coast Writers Centre Poetry Award and the Harri Jones Memorial Award. He was also shortlisted in the Bridport, ACU, Blake, and Newcastle Poetry Prizes.

In 2021 he placed third in The Rialto's Nature and Place Competition and was awarded residencies at the Wollongong Botanic Gardens and WestWord's Daffodil Cottage.

Mr Ramm said it meant a lot to him to be recognised internationally.

"Often you're writing about things that everybody experiences... and you hope that they'll connect with an audience, [competitions] give you that sort of affirmation that you are on the right track."

Mr Ramm plans to launch his debut published poetry collection "Waterlines" in July this year.

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