Black forest and earth's dungeons

Meaning

The black forest and the earth’s dark dungeons figure the obscurity of the generative subject and the difficulty of penetrating its hiding place. The light of noble intellect is the investigator’s means of entry: the spatial descent is also a movement towards an origin hidden from ordinary perception. The author invokes poetic authority, including Virgil, without supplying a verifiable source identification for every feature. These images continue the distinction between apparent, mature bodies and their subtler beginning; they are not directions to a literal subterranean site.