Constellations of imagery ✨ / lyric threads lab: week 7 of 7
Stanley Kunitz once said that each poet has a "constellation of key images, their instantly recognizable beat."
This is the final week of the first lyric threads lab which discusses, writes, examines, and de-constellates lyric poetry and lyric essays. We will practice writing in new ways. We will offer transformative responses to one another in an intimate container. Here, on Substack, I (the guide, the host, the gardener) will detail what we discuss for you and share our generative writing activities.
🌩️ lyric threads lab [the cloud cohort] 🌩️ Week Seven:
“One of my convictions is that at the center of every poetic imagination is a cluster of key images which go back to the poet’s childhood and which are usually associated with pivotal experiences, not necessarily traumatic. That cluster of key images is the purest concentration of the self, the individuating node. You can tell the poets who are working at their center by the distinctiveness of their voice, their constellation of key images, their instantly recognizable beat.” … from Stanley Kunitz‘s 1975 lecture at the Library of Congress, “From Feathers to Iron.”
About 14 years ago, I became friends with Bethany Price who introduced me to Ted Joans and Lucille Clifton and Diane di Prima and so many other poets and poems and ideas. When she was taking a course with Susan Firer, she told me about an exercise they did in class based around the concept of “constellations of imagery” — where Susan encouraged her students to take a look at their frequently used images across their work so far. Then, she challenged them to write poems using images outside of these to expand their constellations outward.
I found the quote from Stanley Kunitz above a couple years ago when I was writing about the connected imagery between June Jordan’s and Sappho’s love / heartbreak poetry. It was clear to me that Jordan and Sappho were overlapping their psyches — they both wrote about heartbreak using the image of a reptile. And maybe June Jordan was aware of this, having lived much after Sappho, or maybe there’s this incredible connection between all of us, running underneath our conscious minds, and drawn from in dreams and in creation.
At this time of contemplating constellations of imagery as they are shared between time and space and individuals, I was a Northerner writing about hurricanes in almost every poem. And not sure how to grapple with this fixation when I was not yet afflicted by them.
Constellations of Imagery in the Digital Age
On a recent manuscript call with dear writer friends, Nicole Callihan put my current poetry collection through a Voyant text analyzer — as a means for discovering core themes, and to see what to title the collection.
If anything, this was a helpful activity for sensing my syntax.
I see that I like more than love.
But love is still in there, at the same rate as “need” and “make.”
And TeeHee is all over the manuscript, but not in a way the reader could sense it. I block out some text to signal privacy or not wanting to divulge someone else’s private information. And, so, I replaced the information with an obscured “TeeHee.” And Nicole made the note that this matches the tone of the collection — playful, possibly devilish, like a plucky dog on the beach.
I’m lake. It’s body. Don’t people make time. Say good. Just like friend. Tell water TeeHee.
Constellations of Imagery by Project
In my current project, a novel written in prose-poems (or stanzagraphs, as a fellow poet once called them), I created a Notion page to connect the scenes with images. First, I assigned an image found through Google Image Search or Pinterest to each scene and organized them by narrative beat.
Then, I combed through the guts of the current draft to identify the repeating images.
ChatGPT Key Imagery and Themes
I shared my poetry manuscript with ChatGPT and asked, “can you analyze the key themes and imagery in this poetry collection?” I was surprised (and also… not surprised) at the clarity of its identifications.
From ChatGPT about my current poetry collection called Elsebody:
Key Themes:
Identity and Transformation: Many of the poems explore identity as something fluid and ever-changing. This is often tied to metaphors of nature, animals, and the body, with an emphasis on how people reshape themselves over time, such as in the recurring theme of becoming another creature (e.g., the kiwi bird turning into a mallard).
Connection and Disconnection: The poems oscillate between yearning for connection and feeling disconnected from others. This can be seen in interactions with friends, lovers, and family members, as well as in reflections on how absence or distance shapes relationships.
Body and Self: The body, both as a physical entity and a metaphor for the self, plays a central role. There are references to the body’s transformations, vulnerabilities, and the way it interacts with the world. The body becomes a site of memory, trauma, pleasure, and identity.
Memory and Forgetting: Memory, and its unreliability, is another recurrent theme. Characters struggle with the passage of time, the loss of memories, and the way the past shapes their present selves.
Nature and Urban Life: There is a tension between the natural world and urban existence. The poems often depict nature as a space of both comfort and chaos, while the city brings about feelings of isolation or surreal experiences.
Survival and Resilience: There’s a strong undercurrent of survival, whether it’s emotional, psychological, or physical. The speakers grapple with internal and external threats, navigating complex emotional landscapes as they attempt to heal or protect themselves.
Imagery:
Animal Imagery: The use of animals, such as ducks, kiwis, and swans, is prominent. These animals often serve as metaphors for personal transformation or as stand-ins for human emotions and identities.
Water Imagery: Water in various forms—rivers, lakes, and oceans—appears throughout the collection. It’s often associated with emotions, memory, and change, serving as both a life-giving and destructive force.
Body Imagery: The human body is often depicted in highly physical terms—limbs, skin, organs—drawing attention to the visceral, often painful, experiences of the self. The body’s fragility and transformation are consistent motifs.
Domestic and Everyday Life: The collection frequently references mundane objects (e.g., gloves, bowls, postcards), anchoring the often abstract explorations of identity and connection in the tangible and familiar world.
Natural Elements: Forests, trees, and various forms of plant life symbolize growth, decay, and the passage of time. These natural elements often mirror the internal states of the speakers.
Living with Another Artist
A while ago, Marty (husband, producer, confidante) and I had a conversation about the persistent obsessions in the narratives we write. While his stories often center around moral decision making and over-devotion to one’s craft, he says my stories all include themes of lonesomeness, isolation, and loss of intimacy. It’s conversations like these that remind me that ChatGPT may be able to objectively analyze my text but my husband is my preferred source of analysis. He, the person who has witnessed me daily for years and knows how my mind works.
Writing Task — Your Constellations of Imagery
So, for this week, the lyric threads lab [cloud cohort] will hold a discussion about our constellations of imagery. The hope is that our familiarity with each other’s work will support a back-and-forth affirming key images and themes. Already, there has been discussion about a number of our writings focusing on caring for loved ones experiencing illness, for reverence of the natural world, and expression of urgent empathy for others in pain.
Our example book this week is Jane Wong’s How To Not Be Afraid of Everything — whose diction is clear: food, gross and slopping, and images of her family’s origins. Her language unafraid to be un-beautiful. Curdling. I love this book as an example of the connected imagery between her poems.
So, your writing task is to identify the imagery present across your work. What language and which images do you use consistently, and how do they connect with each other?
Use a text analyzer like Voyant.
Ask ChatGPT to take a look.
Consult your astrologer.
Read your work with curiosity and find your images natively, organically, with the mind you’ve cultivated yourself over your life.
Ask a friend, or a small group of friends to mirror back to you the images that run through your psyche.
On-looking and Beholding:
Though it has been an astonishing experience, I am not sure if I will guide another lyric threads lab. But, if I do, it will be called [the bone cohort] and will focus on frames, forms, and organic matter (as it is made and as it is destroyed). If you’re interested in participating in the next maybe-cohort, shoot me a message <3
- ’s biography of Sanora Babb is now available! And look at this photograph in the New York Times of her!
- made me a magically imbued talisman for my birthday with wishes of magic, guts, fruitfulness, and awe. I feel so alive and well with this gift <3
KP Kaszubowski (she/her) is a poet and filmmaker. Her debut poetry collection “somnieeee” was published in 2019 by Vegetarian Alcoholic Press, and her debut feature film “Ringolevio” premiered in 2020 at Dances With Films in Los Angeles. As narrative designer and producer, her first feature length documentary “My First and Last Film” (director: Tracey Thomas) premiered in 2019. Her previous poetry has been published (as Kristin Peterson) by TriQuarterly, pitymilk press, Great Lakes Review, dancing girl press, Juked, ICHNOS, and elsewhere. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing through Eastern Washington University in 2023. KP Kaszubowski is also a practicing archetypal and ancient astrologer. In her practice, she seeks the patterns in her clients’ charts for affirming and life-enriching pathways. She lives close enough to the Lake to pretend she can hear it. When she lived in Spokane, she could hear Lake Michigan there too.
😘💘 love you!! Also Paul Mc and Wings shoutout! Wings don’t get enough love these days