What Is This? Poem by Maxwell Mallery

When I was young, those people always said / Life is nothing more than just being dead

Unable to believe I set out to see / the strange truth this statement held for me

And so I thought it false until I grew / And found that that was the truth through and through

So I set out on a path to find what it meant to be alive
And on my journey I met some fine folk
I guess I figured that to live is to do more than just survive
I figured not to take life as a joke

And so to me it seemed that that was all / but I thought there has to be a greater call

So I set out again, this time for a bigger pursuit
And on my journey I met this one soul
And on my path I was tempted by a low hanging fruit
But never wavered for I knew it would have taken its toll

And so this one person etched in my mind / I wept after them until I went blind

One day I finally found them, waiting for me
‘What is your name? ' said I,
Whatever it may be I can never repeat it to thee
All I can say is that upon hearing it I began to cry

I said to them, I need you in my life / without you it is dark there is no light

Their face radiated with the most heavenly glow
And what I would give to hear that laugh again
She wistfully told me that it was time to go
And left me in that insufferable pain

Alas! I must tell you with a sad tone / Ever since then I have wandered alone

Never owning a home to call my own
Or ever seeing a soul so soothing to see
And this one person shall go unknown
But how do I recover from love that could never be?

With heavy heart I must kindly inform / that that was just the calm before the storm

Life has carried on yet to no avail
For I have not found that which I was looking for
And when I did, it was only to fail
For she has left me standing by the door

But what more could I have asked in return / to feel so vividly and then to burn

My heart shall not handle the pain anymore
What is longing without even the chance of union?
So in a dark twist of faith, I took that which I loved for sure.
And pretended that it was nothing more than an illusion.

Woe to me! so it is that I must say / life is nothing more than losing your way

What exists won't exist any longer / the bond we had could not have been stronger

Still I wander looking for that priceless jewel / how many times life has been cruel

To come within reach time andn time again / yet to always leave walking alone in the rain

The dejection I feel is no longer shaming / and don't take this as some sordid blaming

But the feelings I did bottle up inside / those feelings for eons I had tried to hide

But what to do now that I did confess / And was met only with lack of success

Will this grief and sorrow eat me up? / and I shall have to rely on the cup

To numb the pain of this sorry state / to stop feeling hate for a being so great

Wisened by travel I traverse the land / holding the pearls of this life in my hand

And the young pass by and to them is said/ life is nothing more than just being dead.