Talented Colyton Grammar School student’s untitled work is judged best by Ian Mcmillan.

A 13-year-old schoolgirl from Farway has won a prestigious national poetry competition with an untitled work about the seasons.

Talented Emma Lister, a student at Colyton Grammar School, has been named winner of the children’s category in the National Trust’s Landlines Poetry Competition.

Her work was judged the best by Ian McMillan, who shot to fame in the early 1980s through the Poetry Circus.

Emma has won an all expenses paid behind-the-scenes trip to the National Trust’s property in Lanhydrock, Cornwall, and a place on a poetry workshop with well-known and established poets.

“My poem was about nature, more specifically the seasons,” Emma told the Midweek Herald.

“The seasons are quite extreme in Farway; often very hot or rainy and windy.”

Emma, who is the daughter of John and Heather Lister, is a prolific writer and has formerly won school poetry competitions.

She also enjoys writing short stories and says she is inspired by “everything”.

“I don’t like my earlier stuff. I don’t think any of it was really any good at all,” she said.

“I just write what ever comes to me, but I have moved away from teenage angst stuff.”

Winning the competition has given Emma more confidence about her writing skills.

She aims to write professionally when she is older and is poised to enter more competitions.