I avoid dressing my own dead. I made it eight years as a mortician before I broke my one, unspoken rule. Thanks, mother. The medical examiner’s report said she died from “blunt force trauma to the head” when her body collided with the packed rock and dirt trail. At fifty, she was surprisingly spry, so […]
Nikki Ummel
Nikki Ummel
Nikki Ummel is a queer writer, editor, and educator at the University of New Orleans. Nikki has been published or is forthcoming in The Adroit, Hobart, PANK, The Georgia Review, and more. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize in Poetry and twice awarded an Academy of American Poets Award. She is currently the […]
Nikki Ummel: All the Trees of the Field Clapped Their Hands
The first time I had sex was in a barn. He laid me down like a blanket, smoothed me over. My edges were tucked. Windows wide, I saw I saw the trees sway, heard the horses moan. The April fields of lavender looked lovely, buds ripe, seed ready to spread. When he buttoned his […]