Rachael Hegarty is a prize winning poet, educator and broadcaster. She was educated by the Holy Faithers in Finglas, the U. Mass Bostonians, the Trinity M.Phillers in Dublin and the Ph.D. Magicians at Queens University, Belfast. Rachael is a frequent contributor to RTÉ’s Sunday Miscellany. Her debut collection, Flight Paths Over Finglas won the 2018 Shine Strong Award.

A child survivor of the Talbot Street bomb, her collection May Day 1974(Salmon, 2019) has received critical acclaim for the 33 docu-sonnets and 33 ballads for the people who died on the single worst day The Troubles. Rachael has also edited a book of poems by community groups from her hometown in Making Sense of Finglas(2019). Her third collection, Dancing with Memory (Salmon, 2022) is a dance hall of memory for her mother who lived with Alzheimer’s. Rachael teaches at the Trinity Access Promgramme and the CDETB because she wants more working-class and migrant students to get as much learning as they want.

Rachael’s kids say she uses the 3 F- words too much: Finglas, feminism and feckin’ poetry. Her next collection, Wild Flowers on the Darndale Roundabout, launches on Earth Day 2024. www.salmonpoetry.com