Poetry help?Please tell me wt is the speaker trying to say? The signifcance of it?

Question

Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,
Or nagged by want past resolution's power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.

Please tell me wt is the speaker trying to say? The signifcance of it?

Answer 1

To me he is saying that Love is not everything. When you are hungry or thirsty love can not feed you or quench your thirst. If it raining, love cannot keep you from getting wet. If you are drowning, love cannot save you. If your lungs are filled with disease, love cannot give you your breath back. Yet many men are dying for lack of love alone. But although love cannot accomplish these things he would not trade his fond memories of love for anything.

Answer 2

I think it's showing the complexity of love.

Answer 3

I think it means love isn't the only thing you need, but you need it.