Down the halls of empty wings Expurgated rooms extend; When the wrecker comes, they end, Broken down to formless things.
I’m not Faust, and will not pray Time to take the time to dwell; Status quo is gait of hell. let those rooms be done away.
Academic monies buy Only what it pays to know; Newer fabrications grow Where the older legends lie.
As the building comes apart, Driven by a subtler trend, Means that justify an(d) end Subsidize the wrecker’s art
Past, reknown for past renown, Cannot generate returns, Just the interest it earns. Tear that tattered engram down.
When the F&T Restaurant in Kendall Square was torn down to make room for the Kendall Square T stop, Lettvin composed a dirge in its memory.
Eulogy for the F&T
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There’s no pub in the Hub– only singles bars and bistros run by hockey stars.
There’s no fare in the Square– only Harvard Yard and clip-joints that take a credit card.
What they sell at Lobdell is recycled sludge prepared to nourish, at best, a grudge.
Sky and school and spirit are gray– Where can we eat in a civilized way?
Fox and Tishman, Tishman and Fox, dealt us compassion with bagels and lox, meatloaf with morals, lentils with leers– they warped our palates as we bent their ears. Execs and secs, jocks and crocks lunched in leisure at Tishman and Fox.
Now this bastion has cashed in. The sagging ceiling, the flaked chrome that gave us home are no more to be.
Because Fox and Tishman, Fox and Tishman, Fox and Tishman,
Have been f’d by the “T.”
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Lettvin wrote poems for his wife, Maggie, as birthday and anniversary gifts. Here is one.
An Untitled Poem for Maggie
Whatever signs of age our years ensure the states of love un-aged will yet endure, and though our art and flesh are past their prime, nothing in our bond can change with time.
Whichever of us goes, then none are gone; there’s no such thing as the surviving one. whichever stays, the other’s also there but gives no indication of just where.
Lettvin was also known for his witty and thoughtful translations of poetry, including the work of the popular German poet Christian Morgenstern. Here is his translation of “The Aesthete” from Morgenstern’s Die Galgenlieder (Gallows Songs).
The Aesthete
When I sit, I sitting, tend to sit a seat with sense so fine that I can feel my sit-soul blend insensibly with seat’s design.
Seeking no support the while it assesses stools for style leaving what the structure means for blind behinds of Philistines.
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Remarking on this translation, Lettvin’s son David writes: “Note Jerry’s use of alliteration, which lets him fill the poem with asses just as he fills the chair with his own. Even the title is a lisping pun. This is an excellent example of his ability to retain Morgenstern’s humor. I have read several other translations, none of which have the same sense of wicked play. I wish that he had done more than the few that were published in The Fat Abbot.”