ROUGH CUT (NO REPORTER NARRATION)<br/> <br />Ireland mourned the 'keeper of language' Irish poet Seamus Heaney, one of the world's best-known poets and winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize for literature, who died Friday after a short illness at the age of 74.<br/> <br />The funeral service for the 74-year-old County Derry-born writer and academic was held at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Donnybrook.<br/> <br />As well as Seamus Heaney's wife Marie and family, the Irish President and Prime Minister attended the funeral mass.<br/> <br />Those who came to pay their last respects to the late poet included well-known faces from the world of politics, music and literature, such as Bono and Edge from Irish pop group U2.<br/> <br />In a moving and emotional speech Heaney's son Michael paid tribute to his father and revealed the last words, Heaney sent his wife Marie via text message: "In a text message he wrote to my mother minutes before he passed away, in his beloved Latin, 'Noli timere', 'Don't be afraid'," he said.
