Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV was an important American poet of the postwar era. The poem 'Memories of West Street and Lepke' describes his experiences during the tranquilized Fifties, including his time in jail as a fire-breathing Catholic C.O. and his encounters with fellow inmates and pacifists. The poem also touches on the segregation and forbidden items in the cells of Murder Incorporated's Czar Lepke.