In "Ulysses," why does the king want to travel?

,
once a great hero, is very aware that he is now old. Death will be his next great journey, but
he craves "something ere the end" and does not want to end his life as an "idle
king" doing administrative duties, which he feels have little impact.

Ulysses has a deep sense of wanderlusthe does not want to "rest" when he still has the
opportunity to "drink / life to the lees," namely, to get something out of his
existence. He thinks of the things he has previously seen in his life and of his experiences in
Troy, and he feels "hungry" for that kind of life, forever moving, discovering, and
learning. Being still, to him, is not life, and particularly because he has so little time left,
he does not want to spend it "unburnished." Ulysses seems to compare himself to
a...