the radio in the car Mom was driving that day when
I was alone with her and I was
seven and there was no traffic on the two-
lane road outside the town as we drove
past the big cemetery on a gentle slope, saw
all those gravestones rising together to our right
as we listened to the happy song
about the one-eyed, one-horned flyin’
purple people eater
and it was a giant cemetery and we were going
slowly as he sang bop-bop aboopa-lopa,
loom bam-boom
and now, almost 70 years later, I realize
I probably saw her
turn the volume up
and fill our car with music as if we
were taking off, flying together past all death
.
© John Levy 2026
.