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Begins with a foray into the physique, and harkens to the illustration
on the cover; indeed, resembling a sexual ballet of ‘capricious
mammals’. Overall, though, the reader is subject to diverse locales,
including Michael Pedersen’s Edinburgh — its haunts
and taunts and Leith, a journey into its soul through his pulsing
observations. In addition, though, he’ll take a stroll through
Smithfield Market and end up having an affair in a sun-splattered,
sweat-streaked Cambodia. Albeit a strand of humour permeates these
poems, the pages are beset by post-relationship machinations, and
that of a drug-raddled friend, lying prone in a hospital ward.
Moreover, one might say that Part-Truths amounts to a cosmopolitan
romp, and at times may stray into a socio-political venture. But
amid the homages, where darker moments are exposed, it is the voice
on the page — plangent, acute and brazen, even, piercing like stars
in the clearest of summer nights. Take a read. You won’t forget it.
Part-Truths appeared in the Poetry Book Society
Listings in Autumn 2009
Comments on Part-Truths:
The poet Tom Bryan on Michael Pedersen: ‘His poems
are accomplished and memorable... full of original images and
sensuous detail'.
Aly Barr, Literature Officer, Scottish Arts Council: ‘Michael
Pedersen somehow pulls off the trick of writing poetry that is
dense, yet lets the light in, eloquent, yet erudite and laced with
wit, and (vitally) that constructs a story woven from the choicest
cuts of words, imagination and memory’.
Dr Wayne Price, Creative Writing Convenor, University of Aberdeen:
‘In Michael’s poetry I enjoy the tension between revealed
personal vulnerability and a kind of defiant, performative
exuberance. “Birthdays” stands out for me — the verbal play and
energy that’s always present in the work seems more powerful here
with a plangent, moving directness.’
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Sample Poem
Edinburgh’s Seaside:
Among diggers, demolitions, dead
pigeons,
wispy men strut with unfastened zippers, sucking
ice poles in the sun.
A carved out leisure centre from my second year PE days
now a womb for veteran glue-sniffers
and gang initiations.
The Figgy Burn’s cemented banks exhibit
expired treasure: mangled prams, high-jacked trolleys
80’s electronics.
And the Pubs carry trade names: ‘The Glass Blower’
(commonly vandalised), ‘Cobbler’s Thumb’,
‘The Market Thief’.
Inside, a landlord snarls exposing teeth,
like a string of broken sea shells
or the serrated edges of a baked bean tin.
His head honcho gets first dibs
on the local munters, their disjointed frames
Picasso-esque.
The town beauty rehearses her exodus, nightly,
and through dirty ocean eyes pictures a life ‘abroad’.
Her note would read: ‘No love for the Trendy.
See you in hell.’
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