This Is How I Promise To Love You

I will love you with my pointing finger. I will poke you on your cheeks when you’re too caught up with something you found so interesting. You see, when you’re with me, I want your attention all to myself. When I have your attention, I’ll kiss you and grin and kiss you some more while my finger traces your jaw down to your neck, and to your chest. And then I will poke you on the sides and on your armpit until you let go of the laughter you try so hard to keep inside. The laughter that I always love hearing, that makes me happy.

I will love you with my feet. I am admittedly an escapist. I used to be a flight before fight. Yep, I fight but I run first – both literally and figuratively. I used to. Not anymore. Not with you. Not even when you are an escapist yourself. I will plant my feet for us until I’m sure you know that I’ll be with you through sugar and salt, kisses and kicks.

I will love you with my mind and mouth. I will always poke and prod you until you empty in my hands your thoughts and feelings – raw and unfiltered. I will get you to tell me everything you never thought of saying out loud because baby, your mind and heart could never be so dark I wouldn’t see through them. Believe me when I say I love your heaven, and your hell more.

I will love you with all my stories and songs and pens. I will be talking so much that you will sometimes want me to shut up (although you said you never will). You can tune me out from time to time, I can’t blame you. I really talk a lot – from usual things, to crazy ideas I had, to random things even I myself wonder where they come from. When I’m not talking, I’m putting you to life in my Moleskin. I will love you in the pages that I pour over, the sticky notes I doodle your name on, the Notes I write on my iPhone for when I want to make sure I don’t forget a single thing.

When I’m not writing, I’m singing. I don’t have the best singing voice in the world but you’ll love me for it. I will sing in the car, while cuddling, while walking the streets of Singapore or wherever we are. I will make you dance to the beat of whatever the hell is playing on my mind, even when you don’t hear it.

I will love you with all my quirks and flukes and everything in between.

I will love you with open arms. Go far and wide, my love. Follow your passion. Chase your dreams. Work your ass off for that diploma and title that you want so badly. Grab that promotion you deserve by its neck. You deserve everything you want in this world and there’s nothing more I want for you than to have them. I will support you all the way, through the good and the bad. And when the world gets tiring, retreat for a while and come back. Let me love and tuck you. Tell me all about your journey and we’ll celebrate how courageous you are for taking all the steps that you did. Not everyone has the guts you have and I’m proud of you for that.

I will love you with time. Time changes people. It will change you and me – all the more why I will love you with it. I will love whoever you will be many years from now just as much as, if not more than, how much I did the partygoer that you were. I will not expect you to remain the same person that I met. I will only push you to grow and always be the better version of yourself. I will love you until you become the person you envisioned yourself to be and beyond.

I will love you beneath your beautiful with everything that’s beneath mine. Take the offcuts of the wall I’ve surrounded myself with that you have so successfully knocked down. Take my cracked pieces. Take all my failures and successes, my stories and dreams, my wants and fears, my happy and sad. Take mine as I take yours, as we’re left skin and bones. I will love you bare naked and stripped off of everything and not even your best- and worst-kept secrets could make me love you any less.

I will love you in all forms. I will love you with patience, understanding – tenderly and passionately. I will love what we were, what we are and what we will be.