Steem Poetry Slam Challenge Entry: "How It Is"

It may not seem real. It might not seem actual.
It just may appear a nonsensical biz;
But really it's all rather matter-of-factual:
I love her, and that's how it is.

I met her on Monday, by Tuesday I'd cried
Every song to be sung and each sigh to be sighed,
In one day I was born, lived fully and died
'Cause I love her, and that's how it is.

I begged her for hours for leave to employ
My skills and my labor to find her a toy
To bring smiles to her lips, and to my heart, joy
'Cause I love her, and that's how it is,

And she said with a laugh, and a wink of her eye
That there was just one thing, which money won't buy:
A tear from a star, released with a sigh --
Her heart would be mine if this thing I'd supply.

So I turned right around with my heel to the ground
And I ran and I ran 'til my leaps turned to bounds,
Drawn forward by hope to hear the sweet sound
Of my lover's light laugh, in which all my doubts drowned.

In the mountains of Maya I found a wise sage
And asked at a shout (on account of his age)
On what carven rock or papyrus page
Was the secret by which each star I could gauge

To know I had found my love's true desire
(For by this late hour, my longing was fire);
I'd seek it for years and never would tire
'Cause I love her, and that's how it is,

And he spoke with a lilt as he drank down the Vine
That the treasure I sought would only be mine
Once I wallowed through swamps and puttered through pines,
But on Mackleroy Mountain, a teardrop I'd find --

He tried to continue, but I'd already gone.
I took to the wing, I got my run on,
I needed that speed to rest faith upon
'Cause I love her, and that's how it is,

But in Swallow-Me Swamp I got caught in a bog!
I grasped at a tree-root, I clutched at a log,
My ears inundated and shoes all a-sog,
I spotted a Good Samaritan frog.

"Oh dear frog!" I gasped as I clung to my root,
"My quest for a tear drop has borne me no fruit
And I'll never regret this quixotic pursuit
But please help me, or else it all will be moot!"

"Yes, help you I will!" he said with a croak,
And, tying his tongue 'round the trunk of an oak,
He leaped out, I pulled, and just as he spoke
He rescued this bloody and bedraggled bloke.

Though I barely could speak, I still asked him why
Not just hop right along, and leave me to die?
He said "it's quite simple" while snatching a fly --

"You love her, and that's how it is."

Still I traveled on, though it stretched on for days,
I passed seven wonders. Not a moment I'd stay.
But then one fine morn in the middle of May
A four hundred-foot troll I con-found in my way!

"Halt!" he cried in a thunderous roar
Which pulverized rocks and shook hills to their core,
"How dare you trespass beyond my front door?!
You look a delectable snack."

I mustered my courage and spoke at a squeak,
"Oh great troll, who squats like a Matterhorn peak,
Beside you I seem both pathetic and weak
But there's one thing I have that you lack."

"Oh harrumph!" screamed he while felling a tree,
"You ain't got nuttin' that's better than me,
And if you wish long to continue to be
You'd best be galumphin' on back!"

"But I can't!" I implored, "I'm being pulled forward
By the most potent pull in this whole wacky world:
The love of a boy for the heart of a girl --
Oh, can't you just cut me some slack?"

But he screamed, "Not a chance!" and began to advance,
I dodged, we began a deplorable dance,
When he kicked with his heel I climbed up his pants,
Concerned for the sake of my skin,

But he hollered and howled as I clung at the jowls
Of his knobby green knees which smelled like old sow
And I gagged as I gasped in that odor so foul,
Appalled at the fix I was in.

So I climbed to the top of his shoulder so high,
But he shook and he shuddered and swayed side to side!
I began to believe my extinction was nigh
So I dropped down the front of his shirt,

But he squealed like a child and his orange eyes went wild
As his toggles got tickled and buggahs, beguiled
'Til he slipped and he tripped and summarily piled
His hornied head-first in the dirt.

And whilst I was shook to the hearts of my bones
And hurled as I heaved up horrendious groans,
From his hide-haggled form I heard such a moan
I regretted I'd done him a dis,

So I went on my way but took seconds to say
That "I's terribly sorry to treat you this way,"
And he looked up at me, and he said "That's OK --

"You love her, and that's how it is."

Then on Mackelroy Mountain I finally found
A small fallen star in a nick in the ground,
So I bounded back down to show my true love
The treasure that I had brought down from above,

And I sought in the squares and I searched in the streets
And I frequented all the old places we'd meet,
When I finally found her I fell at her feet
'Cause I love her, and that's how it is.

And I opened the box, and I peeked her inside
As I trembled with tension and tamped terrified,
And she giggled, and said "How I've longed to be mine
That purest devotion, extracted divine!

"The greatest of gifts from one soul to another,
The surest of ways to the heart of a lover,
But in this case, dear, you just shouldn't have bothered
'Cause that's just not what this thing is."

No sooner she spoke -- something just broke.

I tried to speak words -- they all came out slurred.

Though I tried to be cool and I tried to be tough
And I tried nonchalance as a desperate last bluff,
One tear streaked my cheek, and she said "That's enough."

She took hold of my hand. I entwined in her eyes.
My freedom, I knew, had met its demise,
She brought me to joy I could not disguise
And I said to the ceiling, "I love you."

Then I turned to her pillow and she wasn't there.
I grasped at her absence. I kissed her thin air.
No one can replace her. None can compare.
And I love her.

And that's how it is.