Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Everybody from my generation will be familiar with this beautiful poem written by Máire Mhac an tSaoi, who sadly passed away at the weekend:

Le coinnle na n-aingeal tá an spéir amuigh breactha,

Tá fiacail an tseaca sa ghaoith on gcnoc,

Adaigh an tine is téir chun an leapan,

Luífidh Mac Dé ins an tigh seo anocht.

She was one of the outstanding poets writing in Irish and she left a fantastic legacy. Máire Mhac an tSaoi was an extraordinary woman. The daughter of Seán MacEntee, she was educated in the Sorbonne and then became a diplomat. Máire Mhac an tSaoi was the wife of Conor Cruise O'Brien, and what a contrast there must have been there and what great debates they must have had.

It is extraordinary that on the same day she died we lost our great Kerry poet and the most beautiful voice of Brendan Kennelly. I did not know Máire Mhac an tSaoi personally, but I am privileged to say that Brendan Kennelly was a great friend of mine. I knew him from home. One of the great advantages of becoming a Senator was that I was able to meet him fairly regularly here in my early years in town. We generally met on Duke Street for a chat. In later years that was over coffee, where we would be pretending that it was much better for us than whiskey. He still retained a wonderful charm and facility for the English language. He was a poet of the people. He and John B. Keane, my other neighbour, had great roguery in them.

I will finish with a story. I do not know which one of them it is about, but the two of them met one time and they were discussing their literary legacies. One asked the other what he would like to be remembered as. By the way, they were also nice footballers in their day.The other said he would like to be remembered as the man who scored the winning point in the final of the north Kerry championship. That simplicity and that genius were in both of them. We have lost two wonderful voices. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a n-anamacha.