The Young Ones Laugh:
One day the king saw a number of children playing in the field and laughing merrily.
"Why are you laughing?" he asked.
"I am laughing," one of them replied "because the sky is blue."
"I am laughing," a second replied "because the trees are green."
"I am laughing," a third replied "because the birds are flying through the air."
The king looked at the sky, the birds, and the trees and found that they were not laughing. He came to the conclusion that the children were only laughing to poke fun a the king's majesty. So he went back to his palace and issued an order forbidding the people of his kingdom to laugh. All the old people obeyed the ruling and stopped laughing, but the young children paid no attention to the king's edict and carried on laughing because the sky is blue, the trees are green and the birds kept on flying.
From: The Enemies, by Zakariyya Tamer
2 comments:
Wisdom is indeed a rare virtue; shortsightedness and egotism shared by most, kings and commoners.
Joumana, Sometimes it takes the young ones to tell us the unadulterated truth.
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