Smoky Hoss - A Question

I write my name 1,000 times,
just to remember it.
I pause at 999...
if I do reach 1,000, and
do remember -finally- who I am,
what then?
Would an old poet
in a dusky bar
buy me a drink, hand me a golden pen,
and say:
' Well done ol' chap! You have arrived.
Now, go and write well,
for now you know who you are.'?
Must it take 1,000 insidious years...names...rhymes and lines
to live enough,
to come to discover that I am really alive?
Perhaps only a fool with a pen wandering
through his soul
would ask such a derogatory question;
but then again,
it just may be
that this is the only question
that mankind has ever truly asked.
The only one worthy of being answered.

Smoky Hoss

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-question-59/