Reprinted from "Poetry" (Chicago) by permission of Mr. Wallace Stevens and Miss Harriet Monroe. Applications for permission to produce this play should be addressed to Mr. Wallace Stevens, 125 Trumbull Street, Hartford, Conn.
THREE TRAVELERS WATCH A SUNRISE
A Play
By Wallace Stevens
[The characters are three Chinese, two negroes and a girl.
The scene represents a forest of heavy trees on a hilltop in eastern Pennsylvania. To the right is a road, obscured by bushes. It is about four o'clock of a morning in August, at the present time.
When the curtain rises, the stage is dark. The limb of a tree creaks. A negro carrying a lantern passes along the road. The sound is repeated. The negro comes through the bushes, raises his lantern and looks through the trees. Discerning a dark object among the branches, he shrinks back, crosses stage, and goes out through the wood to the left.
A second negro comes through the bushes to the right. He carries two large baskets, which he places on the ground just inside of the bushes. Enter three Chinese, one of whom carries a lantern. They pause on the road,]
Second Chinese. All you need,
To find poetry,
Is to look for it with a lantern. [The Chinese laugh.]