Back to Issue 10
by Laura Reece Hogan
“… that he might create in himself one new person in place of the two, establishing peace…”
Eph. 2:15
Always we listen for the lyric—
the juddering across space-time.
In the absence of visible lines
of light, gravitational waves
pull squeeze
stretch.
The interferometer detects a collision
of two neutron stars the merger
jolts through the cosmos,
tenses shortening tether.
Each star crams
the mass of the sun into a city-sized
home.
An enormity never before observed.
We are listening. Scientists will study
this but we hear it now,
the nascent unity inscribed
in the interstellar chord.
I rotate my body toward the distant hum
of us
together.
Laura Reece Hogan is the author of Litany of Flights (Paraclete Press, 2020), winner of the Paraclete Poetry Prize, the chapbook O Garden-Dweller (Finishing Line Press), and the nonfiction spiritual theology book I Live, No Longer I (Wipf & Stock). She has contributed to First Things and EcoTheo Review. www.laurareecehogan.com