Love Is A War

Prologue
Well, the words below are more of the sandals and the belt to Warren Barfield's "Love Is Not A Fight".

Love is a war

Love is a war.

It is that kind of war that you get into without wishing or thinking twice about.
Nobody wishes war for themselves actually, but the war of love is irrefutable.
It just happens. And you just happen to like it.

It is like this:

One morning you are so cool - as cool as that frail mzungu on the beach with a pink pair of shorts sipping overdiluted yet overpriced juice.
You are carefree and stuff.
You are freelance, chewing popcorn cud, bubbling with freedom and chasing your thoughts along some imaginary sandy beach.
Boy, right then, life is food and you are definitely within reach.

Then love happens.

It happens in such a manner that you (outta-nowhere) just find your shriveled self with a sword in hand begging to fight.
You are there holding that blunt sword early next morning bila hata kunawa uso.
Just like that.
In a war of love, you don't ever care about what akina Morris will say...
You are all, "Hey, nigh and nay..."
Of course you are also with a bare chest that morning, and you're still rubbing your face with the back of your hand, trying to gain sight.
You are begging for a fight.
And funny enough, no begging, no pleading and no forcing of your petty self by anyone brought you out into such a readiness for war.
No. You just jumped out.
The moment you realized that the object of your emotion is within site, you just jumped out.
Just like that.

Plainly speaking, that is your moment of utmost stupidity - and yet you seem to be so proud of it.
You are proud of being shoved in all directions up to the front line on the battleground.
And all-of-a-sudden, you're commanded out of your numbness:
"Fight! Fight! Fight for me. Fight for me, your majesty!"
Then you are aroused to life (now scratching your tummy): "Your what?" You demand to know. Then you have to discard your slothfulness for your inner mojo to match the title you now command.
For if you won't fight - if you wouldn't fight - someone else is going to fight themselves into her/his arms.
And love does not play her game in that manner.
You will lose.

Love is a war, my friend.
Take up your sword. Buckle it up. Stand. Jog. Jump up. Train yourself.
It is war. It needs practice. And training. And fervency. And madness.
War requires you to seem to know where you are headed to and what you are doing even when you don't.
You need to learn to protect it (love), and guard it, and defend it, and keep it safely.
You need to learn to fight its battles.
For love abhors losers just as the earth abhors the sky.

You need to learn to fight its battles. For love abhors losers just as the earth abhors the sky.

The war of love is like the grass that withers in the field, then the sun burns and it still withers and threatens to dry away. 

Then you come rushing in with sprinkles of water and you cloth it in it.
And you do it again tomorrow. And the day after. Up until the grass is all-green and smiling in your face again.
You just don't give up. 

The moment you find yourself carelessly holding a sword in your right arm...
Breathing uncontrollably after jumping out of the house, saying every senseless word love is making you mime,
And swearing with your lips, while wiping away your sweat with your left and still clothed in a bare chest,
Is the moment you should decide not to give up.
It is the moment you decide to be the one fetching the water when the grass seems to be drying endlessly. It is the day you choose to fight till death do you apart.
It is that day that separates men from boys, war from toys and truth from coy.

You see, you think love is peace.
And that you only need words and gifts on a leash
To throw them here and there and you are done.
To speak them here and there, then you're gone...
And you probably think that with some certain kind of a fame, color and memoirs an eternity of sweet love will suffice.
No. Love requires the aggression of a pig.
It requires the patience of light within fog.
It requires a readiness of a legion,
And the boldness of a lion.

The war of love is when you lie, "I'm okay"
While deep inside you are ready to pounce on the victim any day.
In such a war, you'll always claim, "It'll be okay"
When deep within you are peculiarly uncertain of what price time will pay.
The war of love is where the heart plays but the body lies down sick.
Love is where the mind dances but the body is numb and weak.
In this war, thorns to your feet have to be considered as water to the duck...
In this war, you struggle to forgive because the agitations of the so-called "gut feeling" are telling you, "Morris, she doesn't deserve it. She doesn't deserve to be forgiven..."
Love is overcoming your lust and the unholy longings within and subduing them under.
Love is when you fight for nothing else but itself.
Love is when you hack your selfishness to pieces just so that you may redeem yourself.
Love is like the paradox of a bird that pants for free air but is also contented with the cage.
The bird whose lifespan is like that of a phage...
The war of love is as dangerous as it is harmless.
The war of love is as life-giving as it is lifeless.

The war of love is as dangerous as it is harmless. The war of love is as life-giving as it is lifeless.

How else will you tend it if you didn't fight enough to acquire and keep it? 

How else will you value it if you didn't go up the mountain and slide through valleys to have a taste of it?
Haven't you heard that the sweetest love is the one you fight for? The one you'd die for?
And that nothing pays, and that nothing is of worth which you haven't fought for?
Haven't you heard that love is a battlefield?
And that only the brave can share the warmth from which it is built?

They say that if you love enough, you have to learn freedom.
But they forget this: they forget to tell us that freedom is a kingdom.
And that to love freely is to conquer the odds of emotion, deception and depiction.
Yes, to love freely means conquering over yourself - taking reign over the kingdom of freedom.
And that requires war.
Yes, it does.

Love is a war.
It demands that you fight yourself into someone's heart.
That's why love is not easy. It requires you to get hurt.
But it is a beautiful war.
A war where instead of getting bruised, you enjoy the stir.
You enjoy more when there is war than when it is no more.
It is a beautiful war.

Love is warring against wanting another.
It is a warfare against desire for another.
It is choosing to fight for one, while overlooking every other.
It is choosing to be contented with one and forsaking every other.
It is fighting against being lured into a trap by the haunty woman.
Or being seduced by the weak woman.
It is a war of desire, thought and want.
It is a battleground for what you need, not what you want...

Love is like this:

Love is like making promises with a sword in one hand and a glass of wine in the other.
While guarding yourself lest one overwhelms the other.
Love is trusting that you won't fall on your sword while drunk.
And that if you ever are tempted to fall on your sword, the scars will remind you of the place and moment you fell to the ground.
Love doesn't want to risk dying because you were a skunk.
No, love would kill you if you ever tried to make it die and face the stink.

Epilogue
Even while loving Christ, we war against our flesh.
We fight with all our might to win the prize - we fight through surrender.
We fight not like men beating the air but like warriors behind a faithful commander.
We war against every trash, against every teeth that threatens to gnash.
We love so much that we war.
Because He loved and loves so much that He warred in order to have us in His arms.
Love is a war.
And it's Him who came to us to teach us that LOVE IS A BEAUTIFUL WAR....

.........................
Written for my one and only love for whom I'll never stop fighting...
You now get it bae, when I say, "We are at war..."
*Winks and smiles*

Morris.