Alas, Seamus Heaney Is Dead

And more's the pity...

Irish poet and man of letters, Seamus Heaney translated my favorite edition of Beowulf. I made a gift of that translation to my late and much lamented friend Eric S.H. Ching one Christmas not so long ago.  Heaney's passing also reminds me of my embarrassing, odd, and unrequited ambivalence about my Irish heritage.  

Rest in peace, Seamus Heaney, aged only 74 years...gone too soon.

How soon the grave beckons, inexorable, regardless the quality of our contribution.