I would begin with the Greek word, omphalos, meaning the navel, and hence the stone that marked the centre of the world, and repeat it, omphalos, omphalos, omphalos, until its blunt and falling music becomes the music of somebody pumping water outside our backdoor.
(from an essay - Mossbawn - by Seamus Heaney in 'Finders Keepers, ,1971 - 2000, Selected Prose')
Oh be still my beating heart! To have actually said 'hello' to Seamus Heaney.
I heard that when he was rushed to hospital and the specialist told him he had minutes to live and there was no remedy, he texted his wife two latin words (which i forget) but it said: "Have no fear."He was certainly a great realized soul.
I was commiserating with my Irish neighbour when we heard of his death and I said it was sad to think of no more poems coming to which he replied "But he gave us so much."
I'm certain Seamus Heaney was born realized. I knew him to say hello to, but hellos never became conversations. I once heard a talk where he described the duality of being an Ulsterman. He was in a fish'n chip shop one Friday night in Belfast, in the staunchly Protestant area of Tate's Avenue. A young English woman, a student at the nearby Queen's University, not knowing the minefield stepped in said in a loud voice, "Oh look, there's the Irish poet."
The manager, folded her arms and looked at Seamus and said, "No yer not. Yer a British subject living in Ulster!" Seamus said he just smiled at her.