Poet writes odes to Cavan heroes

John O'Rourke has a couple of very strong links to Co. Cavan. A former priest, he was based in the county town for ten years, celebrating hundreds of masses in Cavan Cathedral, as well as having been chaplain in Cavan General Hospital. John is from west Cavan but spent some of his early childhood living in Glasgow. His earliest memories include being with his Blacklion-native father in Glasgow tuning in to radio broadcasts of Cavan GAA matches. It obviously made quite an impression, as John is including a poem called Hero (in memory of Mick Higgins) in his new collection of poetry to be published this summer. The collection, Lines - A Season Of Light Reflected In The Night, will be his fourth poetry publication. It will also include a tribute to the late Packie Doonan, aptly titled Marathon Man. John will be dedicating the book to his late uncle, James O'Rourke, from Blacklion. Ordained in 1986, John was in Cavan town as a curate for a total of ten years between then and 2000, spending four years in Nigeria between 1992 and 1996. "I've a huge affiliation to Cavan and the people there. I still know lots of Cavan people and keep in contact," says John. However, to borrow words from another poet, John took the road less taken. "I'm not practising as a priest now but I still have faith. I would see poetry a medium of faith," he says, affirming that his writing is a spiritual expression for him. The poet, who also teaches in a school in Finglas in Dublin, now lives in Meath. He explains that his poetry collections have followed a path of themes. Glimpses, the first, was a collection of spiritual reflections, inspired by his time as a priest. Flares was relational, written since he met his partner, Blaithin. The third collection, Waves, was about grief - a response to the death, four years ago, of his youngest brother Anthony.The forthcoming publication is inspired by all three previous. Its name is part-inspired by the story of how the poem, The Mournes, came to Helen Waddell (a Northern Irish poet, translator and playwright, who lived from 1889-1965) in a dream. "They say a lot of poetry is formed in your unconscious and that poetry is a gift," says John. John's poems, Hero and Marathon Man, are inspired by real people, although Mick Higgins and Packie Doonan have now passed away. "I spent yesterday reading about Mick Higgins in the Celt. It's only when someone dies and you see the publicity they get... His death was well covered in the national media as well as local, and rightly so," says John. "He's one of these people I'd love to have met. Packie Doonan brought me to Croke Park for the 1947 reunion in 1997. I was a priest in Cavan at the time and Packie was a good friend of mine. Mick was there, but I didn't get speaking to him. He's still a hero, some of our heroes are the people we haven't met." John was at Packie's funeral mass, and for Mick, he spent the time penning his own spiritual send-off. "The funeral mass was in Virginia at noon. I was at home and I wrote the poem during that hour." John has looked to some great Irish writers for feedback, and received encouragement. "I'm really enjoying these poems, especially the love poems to Blaithin, the poems where the Liffey pops up, the Chilean Haiku and the other short poems as well as the longer more consciously meditative ones. The book has a sparkle, a very special sparkle all its own, which stems, I think, from the blend of emotional intensity and pictorial vividness to be found in so many pages of your book... I hope many readers will witness and enjoy the special light of these poems," wrote Brendan Kennelly. "The poems are spontaneous, alive to the where and when of their occasion, true to their impulse and to you," was what Seamus Heaney had to say about Waves, Flares and Glimpses. • Lines - A Season Of Light Reflected In The Night, a collection of 28 poems, will be published this summer. See johnorourke.com.