I: Of Consuming Flame

There must be more, much more, to life
than this electric, egocentric, current
circumstance. On this Earth, there must
be more than this for Homo sapiens.
Homo spirans, Homo amans, Roamer of
the Earth for aeons. Thriver through ages of
ice. Homo pugnans, homo narrans*, Hauler Down
of Bear and Mammoth. We are they?the
same line. Give me sun and give me song, and
I will charge our blood with ancient life. Give
me sun and give me song?and the years I'll
sing us back to ice. This chthonic howl echoes
across Metachthonia. Somewhere in the
distance it is answered. Look to the sky, look to
the hills, to ground you in this electric age.
Look to the folk and the past they fill to ground
you in this electric age. I find myself a being of
consuming flame and seeing that the senses
are deceived and isolated by machines. I find
myself a being of consuming flame and seeing
that the passions are deceived and maneuvered
by machines. As you journey on through these
modern times, walk light through the traps of
the age. As you journey on through these
modern times, walk heavy through the barriers
made. Metachthonia! Metachthonia! Chthonic
times are gone. Metachthonia! Metachthonia!
Metachthonic times live on. Look not to these
modern times?where diodes shine over the
sun?to solve questions older than life, for the
times only concern with themselves.

II: The Chthonic Call

Lost in urban sprawl. Spiritual withdrawal.
Lights and screens decide all dreams.
The distant landscape breathed and I
heard the sky above?it groaned clouded
words. Followed the chthonic call; journey to
the coastal wall, where great trees stand across
wide whispering land. The sound of waves
striking cliffs was speech, conversation. Eternal
tones, in the marrow of my bones: "And the
fires burn bright. And they burn in number.
Oh how they burn all across the Earth. And
the fires burn all across the glowing Earth. And
the fires burn for any who wish to find them.
Any who wish to find them."

III: In Mist and Spray

I plant my feet upon the cliff and
breathe the spray of the sea. Arms wider than
the thundering sky. I roared out to all I could
see and stretched flame into the sky, though
immersed in mist and spray. The fire that
surged from heart to fist was ready to consume
me. I saw the threads appear in the air: not
quite cloud, not quite vine, glowing with each
pulse, reaching high from my chest to the
clouds. And the sky broke with crashing light
and sound to deafen Thor himself. Lightning
lit the ethereal braid. All went black. When the
storm cleared I sprawled on the green. And
the landscape breathed. The stars became life
in the sky. When I felt the blood pulse in time
with the Earth, I'd found my answer.

*spirans: who hopes, aspires; amans - who loves, has
passion; pugnans - who fights, battles; narrans - who tells
stories, relays experiences.

I: Still Life

I walk the banks of the stream of electric thought for a ford
back across. For here I am scattered, thoughts asunder, in
tatters. No recollection of having crossed. The stream will always
be found among the industrial sound. This is life in
Metachthonia. But green can always be found among the
industrial sound. There is still life in Metachthonia.
The water runs so deep. I've seen so many taken by the will of
the stream. But I must cross to the warmth of And the green of
where I once was. The peace of life lived at my own will.
The stream will always
be found among the industrial sound. This is life in
Metachthonia. But green can always be found among the
industrial sound. There is still life in Metachthonia.

All you, welcome to Metachthonia. It's like the rustle of leaf to ground
against the industrial sound.
All you, welcome to Metachthonia. It's like the sun on your skin while the
diodes draw you in.

It was verdant and the arching oaks swayed
in a whispering wind. All quiet were the thorning groves, and
shining lakes did brim. Then 'lecric industry arrived, emitting its
cold and lifeless light. Dendritic verdure did subside to oil and
fumes and torbanite.

It left and with it nature's realm and air with
cedar scent and overhanging streets of elm with flowing branches
bent. Although we see the trees around in this electric age, yet
nothing of old nature's old ways does seep into our veins.

II: Asteric Understanding

And on her arm was flame alive. In ink it lashed the wind, a binding to primordial times when flame was close as kin.
A binding to time when survival hung on reading stars on luminous galactic ceiling.
Even before the scientific, even before?in life?we could reach the stars, we knew the stars.
Known in analogue, but known well. Mapped, we knew them as
hag, hunter, stag, and thunder.
A binding to time when survival hung on reading stars on luminous galactic ceiling?when to reap the bearded grain, when to hunt the running game, if the sun should wake again from winter's slumbered plane.
"Do you not take comfort in seeing the same stars as your ancestors?
"If we must take strength from something greater than ourselves?for all that you hope and all that you are?why not revere the sun and stars?
Our forebears worshiped the sun. Our forebears worshiped the stars.
Asteric under-standing and far from without life immense in passion and pulse."

III: Seven Winters

Look at seven winters past?the changes to the world. What, in seven winters more, could dare to be revealed?
So now is pattern visible, and conversation opened, for us, the treaders on the cusp of now and coming moment.
For in this age the choice is ours when to connect or flee. But soon's the time when we will learn the meaning of ubiquity.
Look at seven winters past?the changes to the world. What, in seven winters more, could dare to be unfurled?
Think, Metachthonic, where does it end, the reach of 'lecric nets? Look at present, past, and future trend, and what they may beget."
Having spoke, she looked to the shimmering sky. She saw our past, present, future, and so did I.
In the shower of ageless light, I understood. "Astronomer," I began. But when my eyes fell from the sky, she was gone.

I: Spoke The Huntress

"Hail, Metachthonic! You there! Chthonic human in
this post-natural world. You stand in isolation
from the verdant Gaian nation. All you! Welcome
to Metachthonia! Thoughtbuilt walls hold you all.
You've risen from the Earth long after it
birthed the age where cold light Shines above
sun-warmth. You stand in isolation from the
verdant Gaian nation. Though stalwart, cold
logic is not enough for the pyric human to
thrive and burn. If in the valley of the spirit ice
lies across the river, it's never in breaking
through the ice. It's in the burning of the brand
?in the warming of the land?that ice will
lift. All you! Welcome to Metachthonia! Those
without fire have kept you from burning
brighter.

II: The Bone Hand

At the black edge of defeat, shatter the bones
of your adversary. And howl out to the glowing night;
drink deep its immortality. Before we go into
the ground?before the bone hand drags us in
?seek the moments of euphoria, the fires that
light the great hall of a life. Relentless pursuer
of enigma, incessant as the snow that falls,
stand, lungs aflame, over your prey. Drink
deep of burning clarity.

III: Topos, Mythos, Anthropos

"Huntress! I feel so cold, so tired. I've always
charged, I've never baulked. But now the
summit seems so far. Huntress! Have you ever
been, so cold and tired, like the dead of
winter?" "Metachthonic, you are weathered,
not broken. Be-cause it is dark will there never
be light? Because it is cold will there never be
warmth? It is not the dead of winter. It is the heart of
winter. Know you not the land on which you
tread? For, under the snow, a heart beats hard.
Can you not see its image in the self? Run
with me. We will hunt the spirit of the land. In
the solar glow, we will hunt. Hunt with me
where topos, mythos, anthropos* collide. Woven to
our souls we take our prize. Hear its beating
heart; see the ice lift off the river. Weave this
tapestry to adorn the great hall of life.

*topos - place, location (cf. toponym); mythos - story,
myth, legend; anthropos - human being

I: Subterranean

Glastonbury shapings; Carnac arrangings.
Hypochthonic remnants summon Metachthonic
tenants*. Songs of ages past lived
and died still neolithic. Lore of ages
past has waited for years to come to you.
Raknehaugen, Anundshög, draw you through
temporal murk. Sub-terranean remnants
summon post-terranean tenants. We souls of
ages past, we'll tear up the earth to get to you.
Buried neath the megalithic, spirits of ages
past: the slumbering to rise again. Post-terranean
vastlands, the self in terms electrical.
All voiceless aspirants who hope in hexadecimals.
We are the hypochthonic; we will give you
voice. To you, the innate electronic, to rise
above the noise.

II: Song of Chthonia

"We are the air that wakes with the dawn. We are
the fire that burns with the midday sun. We are
the water that cools with the dusk. We are the
earth that restores with the midnight calm."
The times change like the river flows by: swift
and raging. Never aware where its hurried
course lies, yet ever racing. To take the times
wholesale is to be taken by the times; to take
the past wholesale is to be left behind. To
weigh the finest of past and present is to
navigate the times. In any year, culture, clime;
to navigate is to thrive. Sing, sing to the sky the
dark song of Chthonia. Sing loud, sing to the
times, a call through Metachthonia.

I am the air; far I shall roam
Under the sky in all of its shades.
I am fire; long I shall burn
To renew the self and temper the blade.

I am water; clear I shall flow
To cleanse the self of what sullies the times.
I am the earth; firm I shall stand.
Hold fast to what shines through from the past.

III: At Odell's Heart

When you stand among the pine,
You stand in a far-stretching line
Of all who've stood in rapture here
And all who shall in coming year.

For in the wood you are the same
As those to come and those who came
To root themselves in rapture here
And those who shall in coming year.

To sit at Odell's heart and contemplate the
times among the fallen hemlock that rampart
on all sides. To sit at Odell's heart and
contemplate what's mine; what's mine to give,
receive, provide; what's owed me by the times;
what the times should give, provide, for all
beneath them to thrive?so we know, like each
fleck of snow in the storm, none is alone in this
plight. It's a grounding, among these electric
times to reflect what the times have become.
To shrug off the wires and, in cool cedar air,
think with forgotten clarity. A grounding,
among these electric times. Your feet to the
earth and your mind to its calm. Your soul to
all who have stood where you are?to feel in
their bones how timelessness flows now in the
air around you.

*hypochthonic: subterranean

I: River

With the fresh, fragrant air does the river course by, yet
unaware where its hurried course lies. Driven by current, all-
encompassing tow, life on the surface moved by what roils below.
So as we wend through speech and encounter, the rivers of
underthought carry us forward. Awareness can grasp the path
left in its wake, but never the course that the current shall take.
Brother of mine, when we meet, the gestures and tones rivers of
underthought let fly from your bones. Sister of mine, when we
hear the song words and tones, rivers of underthought seep into
our bones.

II: Stream

And so they connect us, what truly bind us all to one another.
Streams unseen, under all thought, join like the reservoirs
and tributaries ? as seen from miles above the Earth, stretching
into its curvature. Join like the great interconnection
of all water, of all life. As the rivers of underthought
flow to the sea, through deltas to oceans, lakes, and
estuaries. From any of their seven billion sources. The
latticework of human experience.

III: Deluge

How the torrents sometimes rage; how they sometimes
wane to rivulet; how they sometimes freeze with the cold;
how they sometimes build so strong, so relentless, so
boundless as to swell and swell and burst the dam. As the
white water roars into the valley below, this is how
we change, how the valley of the spirit reshapes its
face ? renews, restores, returns us again to balance.
So crash together, run together, rivers of underthought.
Oh the deluge when we gather

I: The Hammering

The mountain looms in the clouds above.
Although of the earth, it stands with
the gods. It was so easy to stare at screen
while all outside was in vibrant green.
So I fed the mind while body withered away.
Now I put one foot before the other and a
journey begins. The hammering of my heart,
the great flesh anvil. The same red-fire heart
with which this life is forged thunders with the
thrill of the unknown path?Thor's hammer
pounding against my chest. The terror that
succeeds the shapes/Surrounding in the
forest mist./The air that fills with mythic
taste/Which binds to me from heart to fist.
And when I re-emerge and leave the
fog with the trees the thoughts I've won are
seared to me forevermore. The hammering of
my heart, the great flesh anvil. The same
red-fire heart on which all myth is born flares at
the distant scent of laurel wreaths, heaves at
the sight of a newfound path?Lugh's fire
roaring within my chest.

II: Vernal Rains

Here sits our hundred 'lectric years in the
shadow of chthonic millennia. Is this progress?
As we sit our waking hours in worship at diode
altars. Diodes only displace darkness; they
never illuminate. You! who would choose the
dark so the sun might burn even brighter as it
soars. You! who would lose the brightness of
the diode to regain the night and its lore. Your
season is nigh. I can feel it on the wind. I can
smell the chthonic climes as the vernal rains
begin. You! who would spend waking hours
with life immense in passion, pulse, and power.
You! who would walk through hexadecimal
thunder with the will of the advancing hunter.
Your season is nigh. I can feel it on the wind. I
can smell the chthonic climes as the vernal
rains begin. "Every age has them. Every age has those
who learn to thrive like sovereigns. Who walk each step
with the fire of life, aware some days burn brighter than
others. Who learn the landscape of the time. Its hills, its
valleys. Who learn to navigate it with precision. With
passion. With pulse. With immensity of spirit."

III: Another Journey Begins

I walk the banks of the stream of electric
thought. I cross to the warmth of where
I once was. I look down to see a sixfold
flame in hand. Sing me the dark songs
of Chthonia. Sing life immense in passion
and pulse.

I am the snow that falls: incessant, relentless, boundless.
I am the rain that whips: raging, cleansing, cool.
I am the sun that burns: awakened and scatt'ring the clouds.
I am the heart that heaves: renewed, thundering.

Sing me the dark songs of Chthonia. Sing me the song
of Metachthonia. Sing me life immense in
passion and pulse.

I am the river that swells: incessant, relentless, boundless.
I am the dam that bursts: raging, cleansing, cool.
I am the stride ahead. I am the journey that begins.

You! spiritwalker, igniter of the sixfold flame?you!
who breathe the essence of fire and exhale the
chant of life. You! Who rend the earth and
snow beneath your feet as you hurl yourself
through endless miles of trails?to the summit
of your pursuits. In mist we walk through the
lands of Metachthonia. From mist we emerge
and build the fires of old Chthonia.

And the fires burn bright,
All across the earth,
For any who wish to find them.
For any who wish to find them.

For the fires burn bright,
All across the earth.
One foot before the other,
And another journey begins.

In mist we walk, we sovereigns of old Chthonia.
From mist we emerge, crowned sovereigns
of Metachthonia. Rule on into the dusk.