"Amid this bucolic scene, with acres of sheep fields fencing us in from our neighbors, it’s easy to lose sight of others. Certainly we count ourselves among the fortunate."

The Distance Between 

"Start with a few words, a few pages. No pressure to produce. No worries about whether or not it’s worthy—of that award, that publication. Just put words on this page. And that one. Grateful for the blue pen..."

Breathe & Push: A Writer’s Work Begins Again and Again

"In the forest stands a tall red tent with sheer walls fluttering in the breeze, its translucent skin like breath. Inside, a woman slumbers while her young daughter plays nearby—a cloth angel in one hand, a goddess figurine in the other..."

Case Management

"In the middle of the night, sirens startle me awake. My ears prick to the wind. Oak branches whip the sky like Medusa’s head of snakes—a raspy hiss. It’s fire season in California. Fall was always my favorite. But that was before."

Autumn Inferno

"Two decades ago I met a futurist. Maggie wore a peasant blouse over her ruffled skirt, but she didn’t pull out a tarot deck. Instead, she spread out a map. She drew an index finger up the coastline of Western Australia and marked our location..."

Destination Unknown

"I’ll make you a little something to eat, just finish what’s on your plate and then brush your teeth, no, don’t lick your fingers, that’s obscene, use your napkin, please, would you stop picking your nose, and if you keep biting that lip it might..."

Mother Says

"In the early ’80s, newly single, my father kept a nearly empty refrigerator. Among the dill tomatoes, horseradish, and Gatorade, there was gefilte fish swimming in gelatin in a jar, the cold, colorless substance sticking to the pockmarked whitefish.

Nicole R. Zimmerman (she/her)

Selected work