William Rowan Hamilton.

The Poetry of Science.

William Rowan Hamilton was born in 1805 at Dominick street in Dublin and sent to live with his Uncle the Reverend James Hamilton in Trim County Meath when he was three years old. A child prodigy, by then he could speak three languages and by his teens was proficient in thirteen. He studied at Trinity College in Dublin and by his early twenties was Professor of Astronomy and Royal Astronomer of Ireland. His greatest contribution to science and drawing on Wikipedia for a source, was said to be, or perhaps, "the reformulation of  Newtonian mechanics, now known as Hamiltonian mechanics", but that just touches on some of the disciplines. He was a giant of his age and has been described as Ireland's most brilliant scientist.

A friend of Maria Edgeworth and William Wordsworth he was torn between a love of poetry and science "though fortunately for posterity" (Dionysius Lardner's World) he choose science, but if I remember correctly Wordsworth may have had an influence here. I read somewhere also of his search for a link between the higher levels of poetry and science, though I might contend that poetry is that which prose can best explain but never understand. On a visit to the Langford Estate in Summerhill County Meath he met and fell madly in love with one Catherine Disney and was broken hearted when her parents married her off to a Reverend Barlow. He later married Helen Bayly. The following are a few lines from an autobiographical poem he wrote in 1826.

The Enthusiast

"At length his bitter anguish passed away

But left him darkly changed, his mind awoke

Its powers were unimpaired, and the affection

Of his fond friends could warm his bosom still

And he seemed happy; though his heart was chilled

And he was the enthusiast no more"

Sir William Rowan Hamilton

(4th August 1805-2th September 1865) 

Sources: Wikipedia and http://www.irishscientists.tripod.com/    and Dionysius Lardener's World. Available from Google.
And with thanks to Google Images.