If This Were My First Time Seeing the World

Reflected like self-portrait, I’d walk
right
through it,

forest on lake, that green gold
that only oxygen
makes, liquid
and alive, and I’d

sink

into my most beautiful last,
and first, moments
of being born,

like the wagging tail
of a fish, or
the whole of hallucination—
the only other word for

something            that slips

       through fingers

                           like water.





-Kristin Yates

Kristin Yates is an award-winning poet, artist, cat cuddler, and work in progress from Lewisville, North Carolina. Her poems have appeared in Tiny Seed Journal, Beyond the Veil Press, Writerly Magazine, Campfire Poets, Scavengers, Green Ink Poetry, Last Leaves Magazine, and others. She can be found at: https://www.instagram.com/beautefantasy/