Rosetree Parable

by Narrator

The key was a seed and when she swallowed it, a huge rosetree grew from her stomach and fed us all for thousands of years until one day an evil lord used the law of the land to claim the tree as his own and began charging the folk to collect the nectar, the petals, the branches and then, to increase his profits, he began harvesting from the tree and exporting her body parts to distant countries in exchange for strange new drugs and spices to sell to the folk, but he took too much and the tree withered until all that was left was a bush and a legend. If only we had risen up and cut off his head, it would not have come to this. We must always resist the tyranny of those who would steal what belongs to everyone.