A member of Aosdána, he has published nine books of poetry, including Gog and Magog (1987), Moving On, Still There (2001), and Surreal Man (2006).
Liverpool University Press published his childhood memoir, A Runner Among Falling Leaves (2001).
Eamon Grennan, writing in The Irish Times, called him "a poet in confident possession and exercise of his craft.
"[1] According to the critic Michael S. Begnal, reviewing O'Driscoll's The Speaking Trees, "his poems often conjure dream-like or visionary states... His language is clear and deliberate but describes a bizarre or surreal subject matter.
"[2] O'Driscoll's poems have been translated into many languages, including French, German, Irish, Italian, Hungarian, Russian, Scots Gaelic, Serbo-Croat, Slovenian, and Spanish.