Odes from My Ink-Stained Heart

Because we weren’t meant to stay a tortured poet forever.

Fayth Ong
3 min readDec 3, 2024
Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

Something happened in the midst of healing. The smiles became bigger, the laughter grew louder, and my heart healed and strung herself back together. When people say your heart will be whole again post-heartache, they unconsciously leave out the portion that says it won’t be back to the way it was. It’ll have a few stitches, probably some scratches from last time’s fall, and maybe even some shards falling off. But it will grow back.

And in the short span of healing, this is a few of the many stitches that pieced my heart back. Love from the right people, space from the haunted places, and time that we’ll never escape, is all we truly need for our heart to be glued back again.

One: An Ode To The One-Way Plane Trip

When they said
everything would change
I
didn’t know
I’d take it literally:
a foreign place,
a different house,
new friends,
and all because
of a single
ticket.

An ode to the one-way plane ticket, with a little bit of firsts for everything: the first time flying to another continent, living alone, completely independent. That one-way ticket held prayers of different kinds, wishes with different agendas. But that ticket changed the course of my life.

Two: An Ode For the One that Inspired A Sequoia Tree

When in the midst of my joy,
and my heartbreak,
and in finding myself,
and in fixing myself,

he
found himself —
willing to wait
and grow alongside me

he,
who was God-given,
who was an answered prayer.

he,
who showed me
what I deserve
and it is possible that even the wildest of prayers
can be fulfilled.

An ode for the one who inspired sequoias and rock formations and things I’d never notice if it weren’t for him. How birds would flock with phenomenons and how there is still a home five thousand miles away. How while my house is full but barren without warmth, I have an empty home with a man, waiting for me to stay by their side.

Three: An Ode to the One who Made the Mountains

The Creator
and Lover of my soul
made sure
that when home feels too far
the mountains will be with me.

yes,
the mountains that cheered for me
at the summits,
and the mountains that grieved for me
at the hilltops.
because He is unmoving,
He made sure I’d be surrounded of His beauty.

I am a stranger,
living in a foreign land,
and yet,
maybe

there is a home for me

on the other side of the world — an answered prayer.
and on the other side of eternity — a lifetime of waiting.

An ode for the Lover of My Soul, the Savior to my wretchedness, and the Man who healed my heart once again. In the midst of my sins, He stood waiting for me to come home. In the midst of my stains, He wrapped His arms around me and took away all the pain. He wiped the tears when I couldn’t bear to lift my arms from the pain. At the very least, He deserved the recognition from the ink-stained heart. He deserves every drop of tear the ink writes. Every letter stained with blood deserves a cry for His name’s glory.

My heart is filled with odes the heart wants to whisper to the wind. Maybe by some miracle, the breeze will utter the right words to the people whose heart has bled as well.

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Fayth Ong
Fayth Ong

Written by Fayth Ong

26 || Christian || Filipino-Chinese Teach. Write. Move. Explore. Your sun-kissed accident-prone creative curly daredevil.

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