In Fire Goes Out Without Wood, Catherine Reed’s latest poetry collection invites us to journey with her to where ministry and poetry meet. We will encounter a couple in their senior years holding hands, laughing and skipping down the street like two teenagers. A mother grieving her son in jail sits in a rest home waiting. The Intruder who does not discriminate. A child who stares and no longer recognizes grandmother who now wears a mask. We will hear the words of a six-year old perched on her daddy’s shoulders “my daddy’s going to change the world” and moments later her dying daddy pleading for his life with a knee on his neck. After 63 years of marriage one who sits with tears streaming down weather- beaten cheeks waiting to proceed. What God whispers to us when the flames of love dwindle and ending with her dedication For The God Who Knows My Name. Catherine Reed is an ordained minister and poet. She is the author of Crossing Boundaries, Between Midnight and Dawn, and Sankofa. She is a winner of the Barbara Pilon Poetry Contest and a winner of Dark Horse Third World Contest. She’s a mother, grandmother and great grandmother. “Ministry keeps me grounded, poetry helps me dream, and my family keeps me real.”

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