event horizon sonnet

by Kara Schneider

In the collapse of us, even light curdles —

your absence a rogue planet warping my axis.

I scavenge the debris: a rib cracked for kindling,

a throat full of comet dust.

The math is simple —

what bends must fracture.

You left a black hole’s silhouette

stitched to my sternum. I name it silence,

practice its dialect: the gravity of maybe

dissolving to ash.

But see how the void hums —

not vacancy, but a cradle.

I burn the alphabet of your name,

let its carbon seed new constellations.

This scar? A star chart.

This marrow? Still chanting the liturgy

of supernova.

We are not lost — just orbiting

the wrong questions.

Kara Schneider (she/her) is a Midwest-born poet and star-gazer stitching galaxies from the fractures of memory. Her work, rooted in the interplay of cosmology and queer survival, has appeared in online publications and websites. When not writing, she is working on her PhD in diplomacy.