“Beyond Love” is J. David‘s macabre yet moving poem from our Fall 2018 issue.

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                                 — After Emma Bolden

IF THE SAINTS ARE TO BE BELIEVED then this body is a thin line
we walk between dead children stacked like xylophones
across a sad and lonely street. I am the only throat in this town.
The lights have been out for years, whole blocks are built from paper-

weights— the kind of city you keep with an envelope and mangoes
on the dresser. Through the broken of the glass I can see the body
as a wire, tapped between two lighting poles I am always looking past
in the dark. I look at you and whisper fuck me till the sky turns blue.

Isn’t it magical how the dead can still celebrate? How I can still believe
in this body as the space I take up between you and what I lose
next. I do not regard myself beyond love, but we all imagine death
to be a kinder bed than grief. We all lack proof enough
to make us stay.

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J. DAVID is from Cleveland, Ohio and serves as poetry editor for Flypaper Magazine.