The Hungry Fire

About the Book

A collection of 66 poems in five sections:

o The early years and reflections on people
o The pleasures and pain of love
o A personal reaction to the turbulent political times experienced during the 1950’s through the 1980’s
o A return to the “simpler life,” good-bye civilization, hello life
o Finally, a search for meaning along the roads of life sciences and modern cosmological theory, a philosophy that requires of us objective analysis and courage to assume responsibility for our own lives.

The poems are written with humor, tenderness, and imagination---an expression of feelings, real or imagined, that all of us may at times have experienced.

Why Did I Ever Leave?

When I was a child I did not mix easily with others.
From the beginning I felt apart,
But I was lured into the vocational trap
And regimented by society,
Rigorously, relentlessly.
Fifty-two years have disappeared before my disbelieving eyes.

The fish struggles in the net.
The caged eagle droops upon the plastic perch.
The panther paces behind stout bars.

I have gone to the woods, hungry for freedom,
Sought advice from crows and mockingbirds,
Plucked wild berries for their secrets.
The nearest village is miles away.
Civilization is a distant dog’s bark
Or the rare passing of a pickup truck
On the rough trail to the lake.
My unroofed rooms are filled with trees and rocks.
The doorways are everywhere, and they are open.
Chipmunks play in my living room.
I play in theirs.
I have returned to my original self, free and unfettered.
I wonder: why did I ever leave?

About the Author

Gene Kreves grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, the youngest of ten children born to immigrant parents. From childhood on, Gene sought a kind of sanctuary at the nearest branch of the Cleveland Public Library, feeding an immense curiosity, reading deeply and widely. He entered the ministry, but unlike many young ministers, began to find traditional religious beliefs unsubstantiated and irrelevant. He writes: My life was dedicated to expressing the truth about life and I quickly found myself on pathways that diverged from the mainstream. I continued to question the status quo, while moving more and more toward those vital and valid values in humanism and science. At the age of 34, he broke with traditional religion, and with a small group of like-minded humanists founded the DuPage Unitarian Universalist Church in Naperville, Illinois. He served that growing congregation for 25 years. He retired from the ministry and moved to rural Arkansas, where he has lived for the past two decades.