They say that love is a battlefield.
So do you feel the beating of my heart every step you take in combat
Does the dust in the air create silhouettes of my face,
Do you try to feel the embrace of my arms
As you caress the barrel of your gun.
Soldier,
Do you gaze at the sun as much as I do
As it rises in the morning
Wishing upon the biggest star shooting across the sky
LORD please, no shootings across the sky.
Sometimes,
I walk with my eyes close
Conjuring every bone of your smile
The heat of its embrace
But eyelids can only take so many tears
Letters can only take so many tears
Before the ink begins to blot
But I can’t stop scribbling your name in the margins of my notebook.
There are days, where all I see are uniforms
Moments, when the only tune I hear is the national anthem
Ringing in my ears,
Reminding me that love is patient, love is kind,
But freedom is sometimes cruel.
I never realized that battles could exist outside of war
Rumbling in my chest, this distance armed and dangerous, eroding my lines of defense
Threatening to rip us apart
I was never as strong as you are
My soldier.
They say all is fair in love and war but there’s nothing fair about my love going off to war
The dog tag you draped around my neck weighs heavy with your absence.
I pray that bullets miss you as much as I do.
At night, I cradle the promise that I will see you in the morning, my love
There will be no mourning my love,
So my love, wear it across your chest, an impenetrable bullet proof vest.
Dear soldier,
Every battle needs a warrior
So I will strip red and white across my heart,
Align fifty stars to spell out our name so even when we’re not together the universe will know
If love is a battlefield, I will stand with you at the frontlines.
I am always with you at the frontlines
Feel me in the breeze wherever you go
So stand at ease young soldier,
And know that I am thinking of you always
Fighting, till this love is no longer a battlefield
But our home.
    -Tiffany Ike