What is it, truly, to admire a woman? To look at her and feel inspiration. To delight in her beauty. So much so that all of your defenses crumble, that you would willingly take on any pain, any burden for her
To honor her being, with your deeds and words.
The hours of pain, the tears, the sweat, the blood, the agony, the beauty of it all mixed and blurred into a color unlike any Benedict had seen.
This woman who battled through the very hell of life to open up the world of the eternities.
He’d thought he understood, what the poets had meant, but watching her bring life, to bring their child, into existence had opened his mind and his heart to revelations that brought prophets to their knees.
He’d die for her, live for her, offer himself as willing intercessory to any suffering she endured. But that wasn’t enough, not for what he felt in this moment, as she wept with joy, and relief, and the purest love he’d ever witnessed.
What he understood now was that love was not removing the burden, not taking what cannot be took, but to change and transform with them as they endured, and fought, and survived. To walk, and carry, and witness to the end, until you both emerge, and to forever honor that journey with awe and dignity.
So he held them, both of them, vulnerable, weakened by their ordeal, needing him. He would hold them, protect them, devote his life to them.
His covenant promised. He breathed, “My love.”