Tennessee Claflin Shope

I was the laughing-stock of the village,
Chiefly of the people of good sense, as they call themselves⁠—
Also of the learned, like Rev. Peet, who read Greek
The same as English.
For instead of talking free trade,
Or preaching some form of baptism;
Instead of believing in the efficacy
Of walking cracks⁠—picking up pins the right way,
Seeing the new moon over the right shoulder,
Or curing rheumatism with blue glass,
I asserted the sovereignty of my own soul.
Before Mary Baker G. Eddy even got started
With what she called science
I had mastered the Bhagavad Gita,
And cured my soul, before Mary
Began to cure bodies with souls⁠—
Peace to all worlds!

Where this text comes from

First published in Spoon River Anthology (1916). First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established. [1]

Structure read from the source's markup; the words have not been compared against a page scan. Last checked 2026-08-20.

Taken from Standard Ebooks, standardebooks/edgar-lee-masters_spoon-river-anthology, spoon-river-anthology.xhtml. Rights: public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931).

Earlier sources (2)

This poem as JSON or plain text. Line anchors #L1–#L17.

Cite this poem

Edgar Lee Masters (1868–1950). “Tennessee Claflin Shope.” First published in Spoon River Anthology (1916). Text: Poem Index, https://poemindex.org/edgar-lee-masters/tennessee-claflin-shope/. Append #L14 to cite line 14, or #L4-L9 for lines 4–9.

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