The Place I Want to Get Back To
~ by Mary Oliver
The place I want to get back to
is where
in the pinewoods
in the moments between
the darkness
and first light
two deer
came walking down the hill
and when they saw me
they said to each other, okay,
this one is okay,
let’s see who she is
and why she is sitting
on the ground like that,
so quiet, as if
asleep, or in a dream,
but, anyway, harmless;
and so they came
on their slender legs
and gazed upon me
not unlike the way
I go out to the dunes and look
and look and look
into the faces of the flowers;
and then one of them leaned forward
and nuzzled my hand, and what can my life
bring to me that could exceed
that brief moment?
For twenty years
I have gone every day to the same woods,
not waiting, exactly, just lingering.
Such gifts, bestowed,
can’t be repeated.
If you want to talk about this
come to visit. I live in the house
near the corner, which I have named
Gratitude.
From Mary Oliver’s collection of poems, Thirst (Beacon Press, 2006)
Mary Oliver’s “The Place I want to get back to” takes me into the depths of grief today. The deeper you go, the quieter the waters.
My father, Delroy Ying, passed away earlier this week on Sunday, December 14, 2025, peacefully at home with his two sons at his side. He had an extended illness, in and out of the hospital for two months, before coming home with hospice care a couple weeks before his passing. At home, his spirits lifted and initially improved, but his body was weak and again began to decline. As I grapple with his passing, the overwhelming sadness is layered with a depth of gratitude. At 86 years old, his quiet strength has always been in the background, spurring me forward into worlds that he never knew. Growing up in poverty with a single parent, his childhood is so different from the one that he gave me. After a successful career as a business man in Jamaica, he moved to Florida to build a new life for his wife and kids. He earned his GED then studied and later taught upholstery. He could not tell me what college or medical school would be like; he never had those opportunities. But he did teach me how to live a good life. His deep strength is a reservoir of love that wells up inside of me. As I walk into Mary Oliver’s woods in search of my father, I will perhaps find him in the deer that stop in my backyard. In the stillness of their gaze, I am blessed today with tears and I feel the presence of my father’s hand nuzzled against mine. In the next moment, the deer jump and vanish into the woods. I too live in the house of Gratitude.
For memorial information: DelroyYing.com