Year 10 pupil Emily Roy, 14, won the open junior section for the New Zealand Poetry Society International Poetry Competition for her lyrical poetry Eurydice and was commended for another poem, Helen of Troy (the scapegoat).
Emily said much of her poetry featured strong feminist themes as well as classical mythology.
"On my notes app I just have a list of random haikus about women in classical mythology because that’s a topic I’m really passionate about."
Eurydice was based on the mythology of Orpheus and Eurydice.
She said normal classical tellings of the myth focused on the tragedy of Orpheus but she wanted to centre her poem on the betrayal Eurydice would have felt by her husband whose lack of trust lead to her remaining dead.
Her other poem was based on Helen of Troy and how she was made the scapegoat for a war caused by men.
"It was just ... how she gets villainised and blamed for a war that wasn’t really her fault and was more about the way men acted around her," she said.
Competition judge Dr Robert Sullivan said the poem gave him goose bumps.
"This is the work of a poet who reads poetry.
"The poet shows echoes of Sylvia Plath and a familiarity with the conventions of lyric poetry," he said.
Emily said she wrote most days, even if it was just a couple of stray pars in her notes app on her phone.
She said she had very specific goals for how she wanted her life to pan out and her ambition was to become a professor or lecturer of classical studies at a university.
