Edgar Lee Masters (1868–1950). Spoon River Anthology. 1916.

177. Perry Zoll

MY thanks, friends of the County Scientific Association,

For this modest boulder,

And its little tablet of bronze.

Twice I tried to join your honored body,

And was rejected,

And when my little brochure

On the intelligence of plants

Began to attract attention

You almost voted me in.

After that I grew beyond the need of you

And your recognition.

Yet I do not reject your memorial stone,

Seeing that I should, in so doing,

Deprive you of honor to yourselves.