Reviews

His middle-period poems often deploy a singsong style whose seeming simplicity and artlessness disturbingly highlight sinister, sometimes-violent content, as in “The Pretty Magpie”: “Once I loved a little dog, / A golden spaniel bitch, / They came and shot it all to death / And left it in a ditch.”

His late period casts poems in an idiom that’s more modern and impressionistic in its continued treatment of fraught, primal material, as in “The First and the Last.” He also offers a long adaptation of the Icelandic saga of Gunnar and Hallgerður, about a woman who brings her husband nothing but trouble; it’s a riveting, gore-spattered epic suffused with eerie Nordic hallucination: “And woven into her straggled hair, / The bones of children / That rattled and clinked in the wind.”

Lind’s poems feature strong narratives, bold voices, and evocative imagery that’s besotted by both Eros and Thanatos, as in the title poem, a gothic imagining of a crowlike lover that’s an inspired mashup of the work of Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Baudelaire: “I am but carrion for your clever mouth / And quick, sharp fingers that rake and rack.” Overall, this collection is a great read for those who like hotblooded verse.

Corvix is a collection of poems written by Valentin Per Lind between 1985 and 2021. The theme of the collection is the interrelationship of the three fundamental forces governing life: love, sex and death. The poems explore the themes of ageing and how we anticipate the onset of death; the regrets of missed opportunities as well as the mellowness that age brings. There are also poems dedicated to the joy of love, as well as some social realist poems that explore contemporary issues such as authoritarianism, racism and the arms trade. The author does not flinch from tackling controversial subjects such as obsessive love and suicide. Many of the poems, particularly the earlier ones, are inflected with a heavy vein of mysticism, owing to the author’s involvement in the Wicca in the eighties and nineties, and space is given to several supernaturally themed poems. The poems are grouped into early, middle and late periods which afford the reader to observe the author’s evolving style. The poems are complemented by notes, a few of which are quite lengthy (something which the author plans to economise on in the next edition), and by footnotes explaining unfamiliar words.

To call Valentin Per Lind’s book Corvix: Poems of Love, Sex, and Death a poetry collection is a bit of a misnomer in the traditional sense. Yes, there is poetry contained within the covers, but more than that, Corvix is a manifesto on life, death, love, and faith.

With this book, Per Lind offers a retrospective look at decades of creative work, conveniently arranged in temporal groups, so that readers can watch the growth and development of a lifetime’s worth of poetry. In that, Corvix is a fascinating, brave look backwards and forward from someone who does not shy away from the foibles of early work, or the craft that comes with age and experience as a poet. As a poet, as a collection of poetry, there are some true stunners in the over 200 pages of this book.

That said, each poem, whether it requires it or not, is accompanied by explanatory notes ranging from a few sentences to multiple pages, and that can be wearing on the reader. In many cases, these notes offer a fascinating look into the inspiration, context, and philosophy of per Lind as he crafts his verses. Standouts in this frame include “Lucifer Unbound”, “Mirror, Mirror”, and “Song of Shekhinah”. However, other explanatory notes (“Samhain – A Prose Poem”, “By Saddleworth Moor”, and “Ophelia Lies Floating” among the most egregious) range from simply unnecessary to vaguely patronizing.   

As a reader, researcher, and critic, I have a firm belief in poets trusting their readers and their work. That a poem should resonate with a reader even if that reader isn’t privy to all of the context, and that a poet should trust a reader’s ability to read context clues, or Google, to understand what needs understanding, and in that some of Per Lind’s notational explanations feel a little distrustful on all sides.

However, when the Notes are good – when Per Lind really gets going about spiritualism, or love, death, history, mysticism, or mythology – they are fascinating. This is a man who has read, theorized, practiced, and professed a range of deeply held beliefs and creeds across the decades, and that shines through in both his poetry and his prose.

Fans of Browning’s dramatic monologues, Poe’s poetry, and the magical realism of Juan Rulfo will all find something to enjoy in this collection.

Much like short stories, I adore the brevity of poetry. I think it's charming that something so succinct can evoke soulful emotions and keep me pondering long after I'm done reading. So, I was ecstatic when I got a chance to read and review Corvix.

Corvix is a rich collection of poems by Valentin Per Lind. Lind grouped the poems into three eras based on the years they were written. It's interesting how his style changed over the years. Nature, love, death, sex, spirituality, ancient cultures, social issues and more inspired Lind's poems. Lind experimented with different poetic forms, but they all have something in common: they are incredibly evocative.

The poet's beautiful foreword on poetry and its purpose is a solid introduction to this genre of literature for beginners. The notes detailing the inspiration at the end of each poem helps decipher the message of the more opaque ones. I recommend rereading the poems after reading the notes. Knowing their motivations made me see the poems in a new light.

Just like music, I judge a poem by its ability to make me feel. Although many poems in the collection prompted profound feelings in me, the poems from the "Middle Period" are some of my favourites. They have a relatability that reeled me in. Even in words so carefully picked and beautifully expressed, I could feel the palpable sadness in By Saddleworth Moor. It iterates my belief that holding on to guilt for past mistakes gnaws at one's soul. As freeing as it is to forgive others, we must not forget to free ourselves as well.

Another aspect of the book I enjoyed are the notes detailing the inspirations behind the poems. I especially enjoyed reading the more lengthy ones on spirituality and aged cultures. They were utterly immersive and fascinating.

This isn't a quibble per se, but I think the notes would have worked better if they precede the poems. Even though I suspect the writer didn't want them to influence the reader's interpretation of his work. However, the lengthier ones sometimes overshadow the poems they accompany. I got lost in them a few times.

Overall, I rate the collection 4 out of 4 stars. It's beautiful, rich, and thought-provoking. Also, the editing is nearly flawless; I noted just a minor error in it.

Corvix calls for an open mind. Valentin is a person of faith, but not in the conventional sense. He seems like one who has discovered his own idea of God and is at peace with it. Though not done in a disrespectful or condescending manner, he has some unpopular interpretations of biblical verses that staunch Christians might consider unpalatable. That said, the collection has broad themes. So I believe every poetry lover will find something they will like in it.

The dead dance in Corvix, Lind’s compendium of collected verse, a corpus spanning decades, plumbing death and desire with a Romantic’s love of land and weather and the spirits that course through existence, digging to the heart of ritual and belief with the hunger of a seeker and the boldness of a blasphemer. Always he finds beauty in terror and terror in beauty. “I would make a fine meal, my sweet, /For you to peck at,” Lind writes, in the title poem, a paean to a woman who seems to have “a skein of blood upon thy ruby lips.” Elsewhere, he offers a new prologue to Macbeth and a celebration of M.R. James, a necromancer’s rite summoning the dead (the haunting, pared down “Evocation of a Spirit of Vengeance”), and evocations of lost or haunted places (“By Saddleworth Moor” imagines the spirit of its “bleak and barren” land to be a father who, driving the M62, lost his family in an accident).

One crucial throughline: Saturnalia, ancient gods, and the connection of the human, the divine, and Nature itself. Fitting those interests, the verse echoes back to Coleridge and Poe, in form and language, though Lind balances some proudly archaic language (“As wandered thou ’mong silver’d trees”) with the directly stated, especially in later works. “And yet the moment when I succumbed / To the anaesthesia of life / Eludes me,” Lind writes in the standout “The Constant Watch,” a consideration of the diminishment, over decades, of the intensity with which one feels.

Death, of course, has an erotic charge in these rich, rewarding poems, as do the acts of creation that led to this world. That powers the keystone work “Priapus,” a declarative piece in the voice of “Pan” or God or whatever name one might choose—in one of many illuminating notes, Lind calls it “the expression of the ‘Primal Will to Be.’” The notes and essays are clear-eyed yet surprising, warm yet provocative, setting down an independent mind’s understanding of Nature, poetry, witchcraft, Paganism, and the soul itself.

Great for fans of: Donald Wandrei, Kathryn Hinds.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A