When mass is huge, gravity grows until it is irresistible. A black hole traps all that passes, allowing out of its gravitational field no object, no light, no trace of light, that has been attracted to it. A black hole the size of a full stop swallows the sentence. Others swallow a house, a city, a galaxy.

Is all gone, none to be retrieved? Entropy forbids all elements from entering the black chasm. As an object approaches a black hole, its wavelength lengthens, slowing down, becomes redder and redder; the information and attributes separate from the object, and remain as strings – vibrating strings, twists, knots, cats’ cradles of information, vibrating at the edge of the event horizon. The bank at the edge of the River Styx, where Charon deposits those headed for the black darkness of Hades. He keeps in his boat the attributes of they have shed. A suitcase of teeth and glasses, thoughts, stories, and old stone discus. Held in trust on account, waiting for them to be decoded, to be reconstructed, to be made new.