NORTHERN Irish poet Michael Longley will be laid to rest this weekend.
He died on January 22, aged 85, in his hometown of Belfast, "surrounded by his family, music, love and poetry", his family have confirmed.
"Michael will be remembered widely for his warmth, humour, friendship, intellect and his many contributions to the arts on the island of Ireland, in the UK, and across the world," they said in a statement.,
"In particular, his wonderful poems will remain with us always, providing comfort and a continuing close connection to him," they added.
"His words will live on for ever."
Longley will be recognised as “one of the greatest poets that Ireland has ever produced” President of Ireland Michael D Higgins said as he paid tribute.
Born in Belfast in 1939, he was one of twin boys – his brother, a marine engineer, died a decade ago, an event that inspired the second half of the poet’s 2014 collection, The Stairwell.
Northern Ireland Poet Michael Longley pictured with the SDLP's Claire Hanna as he received the Freedom of the City of Belfast in 2015It was while studying classics at Trinity College Dublin that Longley realised he wanted to write poetry.
“Perhaps I had the vaguest notion of sleepwalking into teaching or the civil service,” he told the Guardian in 2004, “but I was bitten by the poetry bug.”
His first poetry collection, titled Ten Poems, was published in 1965, but his most famous poem, Ceasefire was published in 1994.
The day after it was published, a ceasefire was announced in Northern Ireland.
In 2015 Longley was given the Freedom of the City of Belfast, as proposed by SDLP Leader Claire Hanna MP.
Ms Hanna, who knew the poet as "a family friend and neighbour", described him as "a prince of the English language who transcended the narrow categories of ‘Irish’ and ‘British’".
"He was our greatest living poet," she added, "more pertinently, he was a beautiful human being, kind generous, open humorous. He was truly a wonderful person."
With many successful years and achievements under his belt, President Higgins believes Mr Longley was worthy of a Nobel Prize.
“Michael Longley will be recognised as one of the greatest poets that Ireland has ever produced, and it has long been my belief that his work is of the level that would be befitting of a Nobel Prize for Literature,” he said.
“The range of his work was immense, be it from the heartbreak of loss to the assurance of the resilience of beauty in nature,” he added.
“In his poems, we find a quiet attentiveness to the vagaries of the human heart, its ambitions, its disappointments, its successes and failures, and above all its capacity for empathy.
“Michael worked to give space and actuality to the moral imperative that we must live together with forbearance, with understanding, with compassion and insight, and above all else, perhaps, with hope.”
A funeral service will take place on Saturday, February 1 at 12noon in All Souls Church in Elmwood Avenue, Belfast, followed by a private committal at Roselawn Crematorium.
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