It’s October and the symphony of fall colors has begun, due to a natural process known as leaf abscission. As days are shorter and temperatures drop, chlorophyll production stops and leaf pigment begins to degrade, revealing those fiery oranges, yellows, and reds once masked by green. Vessels that carry water to the leaf and sugars to the rest of the tree are closed off, and a layer of cells begins to grow between the leaf stalk and its twig, serving to slowly cut the leaf from the plant without leaving an open wound. Finally, as the dying leaves fall, the plant enters its own version of hibernation, saving its energy for the growing season, the great bud burst of spring.
Every month on the program, we ask a writer to select short works of poetry and prose, one for each week of the month, all on a specific theme. This October, Natalie Disney joins us to share works on the theme of autumn. Today, she shares an excerpt from her own novel, “The Fourth Coast.” Disney’s work has appeared in The Florida Review, The Mississippi Review, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and the PEN America Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. She teaches writing at BSU and is at work on her first novel.
Something I Heard is supported by Idaho Commission on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.
