a parrot's tale

Once, in a land far away, there lived an old king who was terrified of dying. He sequestered himself in his chambers, refusing to see his viziers. He neglected affairs of state. His subjects worried. His attendants wept in private. The viziers had exhausted all options and plans to entice their king out of bed. The king's glorious parrot spread his emerald wings and flew up to the skies. Higher and higher, into the heavens he soared. He reached paradise and descended into its garden. He picked a fruit that had fallen from the Tree of Immortality. He returned to his master and said, "Take the seed of this fruit and plant it in fertile earth. Feed it love and wisdom and the sapling will turn into a fruit-bearing tree. Old age will forsake whoever eats from the tree's fruit, and vigour will revisit him." And the king's servants were surprised when their master called: "Plant this fruit's seed in my garden. I wish to glimpse its crop in my lifetime"

The sagacious bird, "Remember the legend of the wise King Solomon and the Fount of Immortality. He refused to quench his thirst, for he wished not to outlive his lived ones."
"Bah!" uttered the king. Life coursed through his veins, hope revived him, and he woke every morning to witness the incremental growth of his tree. "Love it more", he told his gardeners. "Faster, quicker, it must rise." The tree grew, and buds burst into flowers, from which small fruit appeared. Finally, the day arrived when the fruit was ripe and ready. "Pick that one", the vivacious king said. "It looks the most succulent."

The gardener carried a small ladder to the tree. At the same instant, an eagle high in the clouds saw a slithering snake not too far from the king's garden. The eagle lunged and clutched the snake, lifting it into the skies. With its final breath, the snake spat out its venom, and one drop fell upon the fruit as it was being presented to the king.
"Bring me an old fakir", the king demanded. When his servants found one, the king commanded that he taste the fruit. The fakir took one bite, kneeled over, and died.

The king raged. "Is that horrible parrot trying to hasten my demise?" He seized the bird by the feet, twirled the parrot above his head, and threw him against the tree. The parrot broke his neck and met his end. The tree became known as Tree of Poison, and none approached it.

As hope left him, the king grew sickly. He retired to his chambers once more and spent his time cursing the tree from his window. Soon he saw the spectre of death approaching.
While things were thus, a vicious young wife quarrelled with her old mother-in-law. The girl raised her voice at her elder and cursed. Shocked, the mother-in-law informed her son, and the ingrate took his wife's side. His mother was so livid and distraught that she resolved to kill herself so her son would be blamed for her death. She sought the garden, bit into a fruit from the Tree of Poison, and was instantly transformed into a youthful beauty.

"What miracle is this?" the lovely girl asked.
The king witnessed the transformation from his window. "How guilty am I?" he said to himself. "I have killed a true friend." He called his servants in a faint voice. "Pick me a fruit", he whispered.
But wicked death reached him before the picking.

in the Hakawati