Her Body, Battlefield

The battle was here
on her skin,
under her nails,
thick in her nostrils,
warm at her legs,
annihilating
for moments,
desperate for weeks.

When the
insurgency
became her emergency
the truce flag
was waved
not by herself
but by the heroes
she thought might
have saved
her

but she
was given up for dead
on the battlefield
of her body
(or at least, hors
de combat),

and her occupier was
treated with
as if
she mattered no more.
For on one battle
rested her entire
war.