“Hearts in Underland” July 28, 2002 – New York City

The air in the Akashic Library shimmered with an ethereal quality as Calliope traced her fingers along the spine of an ancient tome. Above them, streams of living light wove between the towering shelves, carrying fragments of stories through the cosmic archive. Peter Fae sat across from her, his golden cloak catching the shimmer of passing memories as they reviewed the chronicles of his journey.

“Tell me about Central Park,” Calliope said, pulling a crystalline thread from the air. As she held it, images began to form – the sprawling green heart of New York City, pulsing with an energy few could perceive. “This moment seems pivotal in your understanding of the underlands.”

“It was a beginning.” said Peter. “The first moment when my sense of the intelligences of Nature connected with our stories as human beings. Even in the city the elemental relationship that I had with the world continued. A sense that there was a pulsing consciousness that lay beneath the movement of the people and their purposes. An elemental intelligence that sang between the sidewalks and the flickering lights. As I wandered through the city, I communed with this intelligence, finding my way on seemingly random footsteps into places and relationships moving within that greater thing.  It was a deeply mystical experience.

Peter leaned forward, his eyes distant with remembrance. “The park was my first real gateway,” he said, watching as the images in the crystal thread shifted and flowed. “Though I wouldn’t understand it fully for years to come, it was there that I first began to truly perceive the lands beneath the land – what I would later call the underlands of the Mythica.”

“How so?”

He considered. “I’ve always traveled through the landscapes of the Mythica. While I didn’t call it that at the time, my path was defined by a constant divination into the elemental territories that were my frame of reference. Drawn by sensations I could barely discern, I would wander through Her streets in a fugue, following the scent of something primal, a wilderness that existed within the endless tremors of the people and the chaos.”

Heart of the City

The scenery shifted then, showing paths through stone archways deep in the territories of Central Park. “I always loved coming to Central Park” he said, reminiscing. “There was something mythical about the stones, about the bridges and the passages through them which felt like being in a story. In an ancient kingdom within the outer skin of the city herself.”

“Here, the City spoke to me, leading me forward on adventures through hidden gateways and granite.  To my eyes, the park was a transcendent place, a breath of the green within the urban expanse.  A place where I could hear the voices of the land, my allies amongst the fae, what I would later refer to as the deva. I’d often come there just to shoot photos of the deva, to catch a glimpse of the entities that I felt embodied through the leaves of the forest.”

“Tell me more about that” said Calliope, “It feels important.”

Without doubt, the sculpture of characters from ‘Alice in Wonderland’ was one of the first inspirations for the territories of the Mythica I refer to as the underlands, the inspiration drawn from the actual name for the surreal landscapes Alice travels through in her journeys.

Through the Looking Glass

“And there was a particular statue that spoke to you?” Calliope gestured, and the image crystallized to show the bronze figures of Alice in Wonderland, the Mad Hatter, and the March Hare frozen in their eternal tea party.

A smile played across Peter’s face. “More than spoke. It was a sign, a marker in the real world pointing to something far deeper. You see, I was already experiencing reality as this shifting, kaleidoscopic

thing – moving between states of consciousness I couldn’t control, perceiving layers of reality that seemed to exist between the cracks of what everyone else saw as ‘normal.'”

“Like Alice herself,” Calliope observed, “falling down the rabbit hole into a world where nothing was quite what it seemed.”

“Exactly,” Peter nodded emphatically. “But it wasn’t just about seeing another world – it was about understanding how we see ANY world. The looking glass, the lens through which we perceive reality… I came to understand that we all have our own unique prism of perception, shaped by our vibrational state, our karma, our very essence.”

Calliope’s eyes sparkled with interest. “Our own looking glass?”

“Yes, and more. Every single one of us is Alice, whether we realize it or not. We’re all looking through our own unique glass, our own lens of perception, at a world that constantly shifts and transforms based on our inner state.” He gestured to the crystalline memories floating around them. “Every person’s journey is fundamentally a passage through their own wonderland – their own unique reflection of the underlands shaped by their consciousness.”

Calliope nodded thoughtfully. “And this understanding became central to how you would later map the territories of the Mythica?”

“Exactly. The underlands aren’t just some fantasy realm – they’re the actual subtle geography of consciousness itself. Every person walks through their own unique wonderland, their own looking glass version of reality, shaped by their inner state. But these individual landscapes aren’t separate – they’re all part of the same grand tapestry, the same Great Story.”

Like it had been as I was a childe, my communication was deeply resonant with the deva. There was a intelligence there, a sentience. A presence that I felt communion with. The city herself was alive to me, made of layers and layers of subtle voices.  Amongst the chaos of my shifting shape, such was soothing balm.  It was a quietness amongst the din both within and without, my own shifting mind within the chorus of voices that is the big city.

The intelligence of the city was vivid to me, being of vast intelligence and awareness whose presence pulsed beneath all things, influencing the traffic and tides of people with rhythms far older and greater than the hammering of crowded footsteps on her streets. I felt the cars in the street as the cells of her body, the people as packets of information as messengers within her body.

Finding Underland

Calliope waved her hand, and the images shifted to show Peter wandering through the park at night, the moon casting strange shadows through the trees. “You took the mushrooms that night,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

“I did,” Peter acknowledged. “But they weren’t the cause of what I saw – they were more like… a clarifying agent for what was already there. The medicine helped me see what I was already sensing: that beneath the surface world of sidewalks and streetlights, there existed another landscape entirely. A landscape of pure consciousness, of elemental intelligences and primal forces.”

The images in the crystal thread swirled, showing glimpses of what Peter had experienced – trees that pulsed with aware light, rocks that held ancient memories, bridges that served as literal passages between different realms of consciousness.

“The deva,” Calliope said softly. “The intelligences of the natural world.”

“Yes. They were so much clearer to me than humans at that point. Their frequencies were… simpler, more honest. I could feel them guiding me through the park, showing me how the physical world was really just a surface expression of deeper patterns, deeper stories.”

Calliope leaned back, her blue cloak rippling with starlight. “And this experience shaped your understanding of what would become the Mythica?”

“It was fundamental to it,” Peter said, standing to pace the library floor. “You see, that night showed me that what we call ‘reality’ is really just one way of looking at things – one lens, one perspective. The underlands I experienced in Central Park weren’t separate from the physical park – they were the same thing seen through a different lens of perception. This became crucial to understanding how we all move through our own unique mythical landscapes while sharing the same physical space.”

Calliope watched as the memory crystallized, showing Peter kneeling beside a small stream in Central Park, moonlight filtering through the leaves above. The air around him seemed to shimmer with an otherworldly awareness.

“This was one of the most vulnerable moments of my journey,” Peter said softly, watching his past self bend over the water’s surface. “The medicine had opened me completely, and I could feel the presence of the deva so clearly – the ancient consciousness of the rocks, the living spirit of the water, the vast awareness of the Earth herself.”

In the crystal memory, Peter’s hands trembled as they touched the surface of the stream, creating ripples that seemed to glow with an inner light. “Please don’t reject me,” he whispered, his voice catching with emotion. The words carried years of unspoken pain, of feeling like an outsider in his own family, in the human world itself.

“The wound was so deep,” Peter continued, his present voice gentle with remembrance. “With humans, everything was complicated – layers of judgment, expectation, confusion. The constant feeling of being different, of not quite fitting into the patterns everyone else seemed to navigate so easily. But with the deva…” He paused, gathering his thoughts.

“The elemental beings were simpler?” Calliope prompted.

“Simpler, yes, but not less profound,” Peter replied. “Their communication was pure, direct. The rocks didn’t care about social norms or family expectations. The water didn’t judge my struggles or my differences. In their presence, I could just… be. The consciousness of the rocks – so ancient, so patient – held me in their mineral wisdom. The water spirits danced and played around my fingers, offering their fluid grace, their acceptance without condition.”

“And the Mother herself?” Calliope asked softly.

“Her presence was overwhelming in its totality, in its unconditional embrace.” Peter’s eyes grew distant with the memory. “While human connection had often felt like navigating a maze blindfolded, here was a love that asked nothing, that simply was. The deva showed me that even in my deepest isolation, I was part of something vast and loving – the living consciousness of the planet herself.”

He watched as the memory-Peter sank deeper into communion with the elements, the boundaries between self and nature growing translucent. “It was healing in its purest form. No words needed, no explanations required. Just the simple truth that I belonged to this Earth, that these elemental beings recognized and welcomed me, even when I felt so lost among my own kind.”

“A powerful moment.” says Calliope, marking a note in her book. “What happened then?”

“I continued deeper into the park. Dusk had settled, and I found myself walking across one of the bridges that dots the geography of the park herself.

“Bridges?”

Peter’s eyes lit up. “The bridges were a revelation. I saw how they weren’t just physical structures – they were literal gateways between states of being. In the underlands, everything has this dual nature – its surface appearance and its deeper significance as a marker in the landscape of consciousness. That’s what I mean when I talk about the looking glass – it’s not about seeing something different, it’s about seeing what’s already there but from a deeper perspective.”

“What did you experience after crossing the bridge?” Calliope asked, as the crystalline memory shifted to show Peter’s silhouette against the glittering cityscape, the trees of Central Park forming a dark latticework against the urban glow.

“It was like stepping through a veil,” Peter replied, watching his past self pause on the path. “The city lights burned in the distance like earth-bound stars, but they felt… secondary somehow. In that moment, I could perceive the deeper truth – that all of these towers, all of these human constructions, were simply temporary additions to something far more ancient and alive.”

“The forest beneath,” Calliope observed.

“Yes,” Peter nodded, his eyes distant with remembrance. “In this Age, people have forgotten that their concrete and steel is merely a recent layer, built atop the eternal wilderness. But in that moment, enhanced by the medicine, I could feel the true forest breathing beneath it all. The roots that ran deeper than any foundation, the wild spirit that existed before the first brick was laid.”

He gestured to the scene before them. “Look at how the trees frame the city – it’s not just aesthetics. It’s a reminder, a message from the deva about what truly underlies our world. Every skyscraper, every street, every manufactured thing exists within the greater context of the wild. The underlands aren’t separate from this reality – they’re the foundation it’s built upon.”

“And most people can’t see this?” Calliope asked, though she already knew the answer.

“They’ve forgotten how to look,” Peter said softly. “They see the surface world – the human world – as the only reality. But that night, standing there between the trees and the towers, I could feel both worlds simultaneously. The manufactured and the wild, the temporary and the eternal, all existing in the same space. It was a glimpse of what I would later understand as the territories of the Mythica – the realms that exist beneath the surface of our everyday perception.”

Calliope observed as the scene crystallized – Peter standing in the lamp-lit park, surrounded by pigeons whose wings caught the golden light as they swirled around him. The usual chaos of the city seemed distant, muted.

“Their minds were so different from humans,” Peter continued, his voice taking on a reverent quality. “Where human thoughts are like a tangled storm of words and emotions and judgments, the birds… their consciousness was pure, immediate. When they welcomed me into their awareness, it was like stepping into a crystal stream.”

He gestured to the scene, where his past self stood with arms outstretched, pigeons landing fearlessly on his hands. “I could feel every aspect of their being. The way their hearts fluttered with the constant readiness for flight, the way they perceived the currents of air as tangible paths through space. When they took off, I felt myself going with them – not just watching, but experiencing the lift of wing against air, the perfect coordination of feather and wind.”

“The telepathic connection was so clear,” he added, watching a bird land on his younger self’s shoulder. “No words, no complex emotions, just pure experience shared between consciousnesses. Each wingbeat was a prayer, each flight a meditation. In their presence, the constant chatter of human minds – including my own – faded away. There was just the cool night air, the gentle glow of the lamps, and this dance of shared awareness between species.”

“They trusted you,” Calliope observed.

“They recognized something in me,” Peter corrected gently. “Something that wasn’t caught up in the human world of concrete and commerce. In their eyes, I wasn’t an outsider or a misfit – I was simply another consciousness sharing the eternal forest that still existed beneath the city’s streets. Their acceptance was complete, unconditional. No expectations, no judgments, just pure being-ness shared in the moonlight.”

Calliope stood, walking to a vast window that looked out over the infinite expanse of the cosmic library. “And when you emerged from the park that night…”

“Into Harlem, yes,” Peter chuckled, though there was a tension in his voice. “Talk about crossing between worlds. Going from communion with the deva to dealing with a deranged streetwalker – it was like being forcibly shifted between different frequencies of reality. But even that became part of the understanding. These shifts between states of consciousness, between different ways of seeing and experiencing the world – they’re not just philosophical concepts. They’re the actual territory we navigate every day, whether we’re aware of it or not.”

“I came out of the park somewhere in Harlem at maybe four o’clock on the morning.  Needless to say, the transition from one world to another was intense as a deranged streetwalker immediately homes in on me and starts with their babbling which I quickly defuse and move onward.”

“Given what you’ve described to me so far, I can imagine that was harrowing.” said Calliope.

“It was like stepping out of the majesty of Nature into the madness of humanity” said Peter, shivering for a moment with the memory. “As it was approaching dawn I decided to head towards the West Side

Deers and Sidewalks

The doe walking along the streets was a sign to me, a delicate and powerful feminine presence which held a reminder – that the world of bricks and barricades was not the true world, but an impermanent, shifting thing existing within the larger forest.

“What happened then?” she asked, curious.

“I saw a deer walking the streets of the city, before the cars and the people awakened.” He paused, turning back to Calliope.

“Tell me about that,” she prompted, adjusting the crystal thread to show the surreal image of a deer walking calmly through the urban landscape.

“It was like… a tear in the illusion. Here was this creature of the forest, this emblem of the natural world, walking through the human construction of civilization. And in that moment, I could see both realities simultaneously – the urban grid we’d laid over the land, and the eternal forest that still existed beneath it. It showed me that these layers of reality aren’t separate – they’re simultaneous. We’re always walking through multiple landscapes at once, but we only tend to perceive the one that matches our current vibrational state.”

“I continued walking as the city woke up, feeling into the experience” he said, the images changing to show his younger self walking the city streets. “The sense that we were moving through the forest of our own consciousness, that the people, places and encounters that we wrote and read about in stories were expressions of the patterns of consciousness that existed within us, was profound. In this sense we were ALL Alice, all wandering through the reflections of our own madness and majesty, the paths of our presence painted onto the surface of the everyday world.”

“And did you feel you understood it, the you understood your own landscape through underland?” she asked.

“No” he confessed. “My experience in the park was a brief moment, a window into clarity; into seeing the structures beneath my story, one which would stay with me beneath the hammering vibrations of the city and the screaming of people’s thoughts that defined my everyday life. Nonetheless, it was the fragment of a vision that would unfold across my story for years to come.”

Yet what was MY underland? What were the realms and territories that I moved through? Why was my awareness shifting from one dimension of self to another uncontrollably?

I resolved to explore the underground, what was called ‘wonderland’ or ‘underland’, to map out it’s territories and come to make sense of my shifting world.

“And this is what you hope to show others through the Mythica?” Calliope turned back to him, her eyes reflecting the infinite stories contained in the library around them.

“Exactly. It’s about helping people recognize that they’re already moving through these mythical territories, already experiencing these shifts in perception and reality. The looking glass isn’t something we need to find or create – it’s the lens through which we’re already seeing the world. The question is: can we become aware of our lens? Can we learn to adjust it? Can we begin to see the deeper patterns and meanings that are always present, just waiting to be perceived?”

Calliope smiled, gathering the crystal threads of memory back into the akashic records. “And so Central Park became more than just a location in your story – it became a template for understanding how personal myth manifests in the real world.”

“Yes,” Peter said softly, watching as the images of that pivotal night faded back into the eternal library. “It showed me that the mythical isn’t somewhere else – it’s right here, in every moment, in every place. We just have to learn to see through the looking glass of our own consciousness to perceive it.”

The library hummed with quiet energy as they sat in contemplation, the endless stories of human consciousness flowing around them like rivers of light, each one a unique lens through which reality was perceived, each one a gateway to understanding the vast territories that lay beneath the surface of the world.