Prepositions

from “Bildungsroman” Malachi Black                         i.m. Scott David Campbell (1982-2012)
Streetlights were our stars,
hanging from the midnight    
                                       in a planetary arc
above each empty ShopRite    
parking lot—spreading     
                                       steam-bright
through the neon dark--
buzzing like ghost locusts,
                                       trembling in the chrome
trance of an electrical charge
nested in each exoskeleton--
                                        pulling, pooling
a single syllable of light
from the long braid      
                                        of the powerlines
sighing above us as we climbed    
through bedroom windows
                                       with our hair combed
and our high-tops carefully untied--
as we clung to vinyl siding,
                                       as we crawled
crablike across rooftops, edging
toe-first toward the gutters
                                       so as not to rouse
the dogs—as we crept down    
onto cold drainpipes     
                                       through the lightning
in our lungs, leaping at last
into our shadows and at last
                                       onto the lawn,
landing as if in genuflection
to the afterhours fog--
                                       fluorescent
as the breath we left
beside us on the train tracks
                                       as we walked
each toward the others,
toward the barebulb
                                       glow of stardust
on the dumpsters
in the vacant late-night, lost