Pluto kissed Charon:
by James Penha
pas de deux of rock and ice—
now their solo turns
I shall use the headlines of The Guardian story as the ideal brief explanation of the recently-published research and of my sciku: “‘Kiss and capture’: scientists offer new theory on how Pluto got its largest moon. Findings suggest Charon collided with dwarf planet and then pair briefly rotated together before separating.”
Further reading:
‘Capture of an ancient Charon around Pluto’, 2025, Denton, C.A., Asphaug, E., Emsenhuber, A., & Melikyan, R., Nature Geoscience, available: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-024-01612-0
‘‘Kiss and capture’: scientists offer new theory on how Pluto got its largest moon’, 2025, Davis, N., The Guardian, available: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/jan/06/new-theory-how-pluto-got-its-largest-moon-charon
‘Pluto May Have Captured Its Biggest Moon After an Ancient Dance and Kiss’, 2025, O’Callaghan, J., The New York Times, available: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/08/science/pluto-moon-kiss-charon.html
Author bio:
Expat New Yorker James Penha (he/him 🌈) has lived for the past three decades in Indonesia. Nominated for Pushcart Prizes in fiction and poetry, his work is widely published in journals and anthologies. His newest chapbook of poems, American Daguerreotypes, is available for Kindle. Penha edits TheNewVerse.News, an online journal of current-events poetry. You can find out more about James’ poetry on his website https://jamespenha.com and catch up with him on BlueSky @jamespenha.bsky.social