A Picky Poet

A certain poet had written a play, and arrangements were being made to perform it. Of course, the poet was asked to give his advice on the scenery, the lighting, and all the other things that help to make a play successful, and he proved to be a very difficult man to please, as he had his own very definite ideas of how each scene should look.

In one of the scenes in the play, it was necessary to produce the effect of a wonderful sunset, which the young lovers watched together before singing one of their great love songs. The theatre electricians worked very hard to produce this sunset effect. They tried out all kinds of arrangements and combinations of lights – red lights, orange lights, yellow lights, blue lights, lights from above, lights from behind, lights from the front, lights from the sides - but nothing satisfied the poet, until suddenly he saw exactly the effect that he had been dreaming of producing ever since he had written his play.

'That's it!' he shouted excitedly to the electricians behind the stage. 'That's just right! Keep it exactly like that!'

'I'm sorry, sir,' answered the chief electrician, 'but we can't keep it like this.'

'Why ever not?' asked the poet angrily.