Then came the parrot, holding sugar in its beak, clad in green like the pistachio, and adorned with a golden collar. Compared with its splendour, the falcon is but a gnat, and everywhere the green is the reflection of its plumage. Sugar flows from its speech, for it nibbles sugar from the early morning. Hear what it says: “Base people and hearts of steel,” it said, “have shut me up, charming as I am, in an iron cage. Imprisoned here, I ardently long for the Fountain of the Water of Immortality guarded by Khizr. Like him, I am clad in green, for I am the Khizr of the birds. I would fain drink from the fountain of that water, but I have not the strength to rise to the wing of the Simurgh; Khizr’s fountain is enough for me.”
The hoopoe answered her: “O Thou who hast no conception of happiness!”
The hoopoe answered her: “O Thou who hast no conception of happiness!”
“Know that he who does not know how to renounce his life is no man. Life was given thee that thou mightest possess, for a single instant, a worthy friend. Sincerely seek the water of life; set forth, therefore, for thou hast not the almond, but only its shell. Wouldst thou sacrifice thy life for the fair? Imitate men worthy of the name, by entering boldly upon their path.”