Natalie Padilla Young was raised in northern Utah by a Puerto Rican mother and a father who is a “direct descendant” of Brigham Young. Her first full-length poetry collection All of This Was Once Under Water (Quarter Press, 2023) mixes the history and scenery of Utah with speculative fiction and is beautifully illustrated by the German artist Maximiliane Spieß. Natalie’s poems have appeared in Green Mountains Review, Tampa Review, Rattle, South Dakota Review, Los Angeles Times, Tar River Poetry, Terrain.org, Verse Daily, and elsewhere. In 2009, she cofounded Sugar House Review, an independent, award-winning poetry magazine based out of Utah, and is now the editor in chief and designer.
Natalie earned a BFA in art/graphic design with an English minor from Utah State University, and an MFA in creative writing from Lesley University.
She serves on the advisory boards for Lightscatter Press and Utah Division of Arts and Museums. By day, she is an art director and has worked in advertising, marketing, and communications for over 20 years. She lives in Cedar City with the poet Nano Taggart and their dogs.
Work
A Floridian Says
A Floridian Says
I Could Never Live in a Place Like That
A few creeks scattered about,
the sound of rounded pebbles and mallards
behind gates.
A set of sprinklers, the bathroom faucet—
the only ways to wet July knuckles.
An instant after Brigham Young decreed
in high fever, This is the right place,
a number of his saints said,
No.
Spun their wagon wheels and blistered heels
against cracks in the dirt
to return East or urge their oxen forward
to promises of something gold, something moist.
This place is a high-mountain desert.
A desert.
The aliens don’t care
how many pollens itch the throat
or if you see Begonias that thrive—
those things stay alive
because someone hoses them down
every day.
Every day
someone
hoses them down.
Published in Burntdistrict and All of This Was Once Under Water.
Sacrament Meeting Started...
Sacrament Meeting Started the Three Hours of Church on Sunday
A friend taught her how to pass the time: flip through
the hymn book and add “in the bathtub”
after any song title: “How Great Thou Art…in the Bathtub”
“Now Let Us Rejoice…in the Bathtub”
“Did You Think to Pray in the Bathtub?” “Know This,
That Every Soul Is Free in the Bathtub.”
An hour of speeches broken up by hymns,
prayers and eating Christ’s blood and body (blessed,
white Wonder Bread and a doll’s cup
of water for each worthy member).
She no longer sits through church meetings or questions
her questioning, though often hums those hymns
around the house, slips holy
ingrained choruses into a tub of hot water.
Ears immersed, She can hear the sounds
of her own choir. The heart’s bahdum, bah-dum
bahdum, too fast for its own good. “Rejoice a Glorious Sound
Is Heard…in the Bathtub.” From a gurgle
to a shout, rustling empty
stomach. Whooshes of breath tunnel in and out. Hard enough
to simply sit still, then left to a porcelain amphitheater—
“Where Can I Turn for Peace?” In the bathtub
thoughts thud and whirl. “Come Along, Come Along”
“With All the Power of Heart and Tongue.”
Maintenance of this submerged body
too tough, too much “Master the Tempest Is Raging.”
Not enough still, small whisper:
“Ye Simple Souls Who Stray”
“Let Us All Press On.”
Published in The Wax Paper and All of This Was Once Under Water.
Earth Ghosts
Earth Ghosts
The light is morning: a slow spread with most of the landscape long and lean in shadow. The front yard is an orchard: fruit fallen and fruit on the branch give a crowded smell to the half-lit air. The alien startles from movement between leaves, cloaked by trees and said shadow: a white horse softly chews the fallen apples. So soft it’s hard to believe he exists. Half a mile up the hill: a flat open field without structure or crop whose purpose seems to be to wait for a purpose. Two weeks ago this waiting field bobbed with prairie dogs, their small heads popping in and out click, click, clicking, Danger! at the alien’s approach. Now the ground is silent, littered with soda bottles and doors to empty tunnels. The alien looked into these creatures: due to dwindling wide, open spaces, prairie dogs are protected, listed Endangered. Which means: the field was emptied by Forest Service rules and relocation cages. Or: someone else came with no rules, no cages and a label of Pest. Puffed like half a balloon, a white bag rolls at the edge of the lot, over one dirt mound and then another.
Published in The Shore and All of This Was Once Under Water.
The Great Salt Lake has been shrinking...
The Great Salt Lake has been shrinking since the rounding of the last ice age.
The monster has lasted centuries
with little light, in one place.
This lake once spanned hundreds of monsters,
millions of gallons to roam.
Now he has a small city, a village
deep enough to safely travel. He doesn’t mind much,
but wonders about humans and sun.
What will be done when the many things collected
are uncovered? Bones and rings and rocks.
What was lost. Cast off.
The trash of time. He and his house release
only what breathes oxygen or is little enough
to evaporate.
Life gets smaller. Salt gets thicker.
The monster doesn’t consider lost love or favorites,
the monster wants to know
what fresh water tastes like, how big a lung feels
when it inhales.
Published in Pilgrimage and All of This Was Once Under Water.
Bibliography
All of This Was Once Under Water, Quarter Press, 2023
Three Essays on Craft by O:JA&L Featured Writers, Buttonhook Press, 2020
Links
• Utah Humanities’ Check Your Shelves Podcast: https://bit.ly/CheckYourShelves4
• Rattle Magazine’s Rattlecast 206, August 2023: https://bit.ly/Rattlecast-Young
• Cambridge Common Writers Spotlight Interview, February 2023: https://bit.ly/Young-CambridgeCommonWriters
