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Leanne Padgett
 Leanne
has been a resident of Vancouver since 1998. Her poems Fogsleep, Kits Bus and
Street Sliding have been published in Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine. She has
been a featured reader at Sugar Suite Café and Chapters on Robson, and has
performed at numerous Vancouver literary festivals since 2004. She was the only
female competitor to proceed to Story Slam semi-finals in October 2006, where
she performed her stories “Roadkill” and “Audible Orgasms (Not a Peep).” She is
currently working on her third published collection of poetry and continues
storytelling at a wide variety of Vancouver venues, whether they want it or not.
Contact:
upendup@gmail.com
Selected Poem:
Greyhound Expectations
I’m on the bus back to Vancouver
And so far things are quiet
Not like the ride up
Before Christmas is the worst time
To take the Greyhound
When people have nothing on their minds
But the dull ache of their hearts
And fleeting expectations
I always sit close to the crazy person
One Christmas Eve
The man sitting behind me
Got kicked off the bus for being drunk
He took himself
And his clinking carry-on
Out to the freeway to hitchhike
Soon after, we hit a holiday traffic jam
And the drunk man passed us on foot
He gave us the finger
This time
During the steepest section
Of the Coquihalla highway
The woman sitting in front of me
Asked the driver to stop the bus
Then she asked the boy across from her
For a sip of his water
He let her keep the bottle
She asked him if he had been saved
His eyebrows bunched up in the middle
Like he had smelled something terrible
And then he ignored her
A tall tattooed man
With a voice as pliant and tender
As a nubile willow branch
Asked to change seats with the boy
To discuss the topic of being saved
With the hollow-eyed woman
He knew how high she was
So he asked her what she was on
She said she had foolishly taken Meth
As opposed to the usual – Crack Cocaine
I guess she was treating herself to a change
For the holidays
Or maybe she got her bottles mixed up
In the medicine cabinet
In her haste to alleviate
The pressures of the season
He asked if she was hurting inside
And I put my headphones on
And pretended not to listen to her
Wailing about her mother
Not loving her enough
He offered her his cell phone
To call her mother
To arrange for a place where she could sober up
As we coasted into Kelowna
She peered at me
Through the crack
Between the seats
And smiled
Cherubic
As her Afghan-blanketed daughter
Slept in the seat beside her
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