the adventures of untitled watch

In may i send off  three of my  poems to a anthology poetry contest and received notification back they wanted to publish one   honestly i had not expected   them to publish  the ironic  England i love this Republic in a collection of jubilee poems  and they did not instead it was the  one hailed by  forum poster as  the waste land in ten lines   the  watch the road  http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/watch-the-road/  poem with its images of decline decay and" no metaphor of ship wreck sea hating and depressing "   but oddly they called it "untitled watch"   and wanted me to buy  a lot of copies of the anthology  to get it published   so it was vanity publishing after all
looking back even on my poems of 2009-2011 in my own book  http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=christopher+lantern+his+midnight+name+&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Achristopher+lantern+his+midnight+name+&ajr=0  i find that old stuff pretty old fashioned  and trite compared to my latest work but keeping the best stuff to myself  latest  about a fight beyond a knight and a future astronaut " lost spaceman, Dome and a million shades"  in a city that is alternating between   21st century and medieval


 

where in our quiet times are the refugees from future wars?

good Olympic opening ceremony   and emphasis on London pride   god bless em
i had written an ode to the Olympics in april but since forgotten it starts "score down the torch , run race to last place" cannot help be ironic  often dreamt that 2036  is  the last summer Olympic games   and it goes the way of the world  cup   and despite all the 60s and 70s poptastic  theme of the 2012 opening ceremony  the 2060s and 70 s will be years  of change and  ultimate world conflict   on a level to   reduce all nations! but then again  if so why  is not the present  day  quiet  and historically uneventful as it is  full of  refugees from future wars ?

read  new york   the art guide    by morgan falconer   over 60  museums   but not as would have been helpful a museum by museum guide    but rather a theme gallery  of all the cities  museums from early civilization to medieval   art and nation by nation schools of painting    from  the met to the whitney  the MOCA and the MOBA    most of the book was a typical tames and huson  modern art  guide with  colour tab sections on art and artists   colourful is the description of this book   as it read like like pictures and hypertext
the knight a medieval users guide one of the many   user friendly 60 second   history type guides   using  text boxes and the  beas bits from long medieval chronicles  on little fact blocks  god sections on all the history of the knight from damsels  to   mercenaries   loot and booty to campaigning


 the times encyclopaedia of   world religions from   the summerians to  new age religions in Asia using maps from the times atlas of history  all the main mythologies in summary and art  all the main religions in brief history  although this is the first book on the subject  i have read that has a tabbed inset   on page 169 stating the author disassociates himself from the content  on that page

one hundred favourite poems   chosen by classic fm readers   from  masefield to marvell    adleshop to  dover beach    from the highwayman to the listeners    the ones we regard as classic as they are remembered


re redundancy some sort of lifeline funding but  half the money from  last year  decided not wanting to do  any college course  not travel outside my comfort zone as having too much anxiety

palpatine teenage dark lord a rebel with out a cause

read  darth plagueis  by james lucerno    a factory line  star wars novel   set over 40 years before new hope  a back story of darth succession  from sith master to sith master   and a young palpatine who outdoes anakin as  as   a  irritating teen rebel    as stiff as a historical novel  the book by lucerno a profesional star wars  genre novelist   only  comes alive with movie familiar characters such as Dooko  , Jedi cliches and  catina lowlifes  and  as a back story only fills a hole in the  narrative  rather than tells  a good tale

dakota cipher  by william dietrich   another  ethan gage adventure this at the last crusade plot level    set in the wild west of  pre lewis and clark   it has enough villains  , beautiful ladies and heroes  to fill a hundred action scenes and thunders along to the climax beneath a huge lightning tree and a  long lost  norse god  treasure   a enjoyable way to pass the time read and enjoy

legions  of Rome the definite history of every  Imperial Roman legion  by Stephen Dando-collins  
a great  addition to the usual  tomes about Roman military  warfare    this 600  page book tells the campaign history of every  Roman legion from the fall of the Republic to the sack of Rome    
part 1  details Roman legionary life from kit to  enlistment   procedures  
Part 2 includes a  history of every Roman legion  and offers new theories on the disappearance of the 9th Legion and the origins of the 10th legion
part 3 is a chronological  summary of every Legion campaign from the wilds of caledonia  to the  cities of Persia from the year of the three emperors to severan  campaigns
idea for history buffs , diorama  modellers  and  anyone  who has watched  a Roman epic  movie

the age of chivalry  by  hywel williams the story of medieval europe  lavishly illustrated   an introduction to medieval life   idea for someone like me who spent their child hood  memorizing medieval king lists and who   could name  the  battles of the black prince  by age ten   good sections on florentine city life,  the kingdom of anjou -Naples and  the  100 years war    sadly no mention of any  northern kingdom such as sweden    or much on germany beyond the salian  and hohenstaufen dynasties  but a great  book to read overall

A sleeping engine my time travel by dream

This is one of my latest poems   oddly like  xanadu revealed in a  dream
 I was  actually  in the medieval period between ruins  and  medieval reality  witnessing  some sort of    forgotten crime of passion     as it happened  

 England has lot of ghost couples unhappy in love haunting and haunting
 but most you realise are  from stories of fiction    or tourist  traps  - no real way to trace the origins of this  

I live out  the past

A sleeping engine  in a shocked  blank room

Older than saxons

Older than jutes

Older than older !

The land gives back

Dreary English ghosts

Demonic and  inertly orthodox

Wake a  dread height

Travelling aquatint gives us light

Spilling utter twisted dust

 Lace, frost and the same ringing weather from here to there

May day festival  and hobby hob foul 

chalk horse  chases down grass  giant

this is a complex relationship  of  love and  place

two  of the other strangers dance

he rejected !

she repelled !

many lives are here

safety in numbers 

car drawn farm cart coarse with  hanged man 

maid in her grave

a romance of  the medieval from beginning to end

tear it up   bring candle to water 

canon origins of the borg

read  star trek destiny  three novels in one   by david mack  this is the  canon trilogy that  at last gives a credible origin for the borg  finalyy getting away  from Vger or  as part of a failed medical experiment  light years away  three novels  gods of night, mere mortals and  lost souls  make a raygun rip roaring space opera combining  characters starships types, planets and aliens  form all the post TOS star trek franchise from next generation to   enterprise and set  15 years after the best of both worlds sets the stage fro a  galaxy wide  Borg war   probably the best  star trek novels I have read  as they are so familiar even to the Gorn and Tholians   but on the negative side when you have read one paragraph about a Borg cube being destroyed by star fleets  secret weapon you do not expect the same scene again  and again   across three books  and that the Borg origins come late but already guessed  and in one of many subspace temporal wormholes  all the way back to  events in    Earths prehistory

the Atlantis code by charles broclaw is the opposite poorly written  an airport novel full of hot air and   dull Vatican  villains and Russian   gangsters   the Atlantis code is sub dan brown even to  the finding  of anachronistic  Christian gnostic  type secret scriptures as the  big secret  in Atlantean  ruins


ode to the sea  a national trust poetry book  mix of sea fevers , rimes of ancient mariners and odes to mermaids  and   rock pools  interesting but  a companion table book


 A complete guide to the soul  by Patrick harpur the cover blurb asks  Who am I? What's my life's purpose? Where am I going when I die? and the back cover calls this important  book  well the  cover questions are not answered and it  mainly another book on  neoplatonist thought  diamons and psyche  with added freudian dreams and jungian symbols 







 not had many interesting or vivid dreams fro months   mainly dream of college campus  and catching public transport  these must be my inner fears 

building an astronomical cross staff

have interview next week so  should actually use my own interview practice resources  myself

  found various  sites where you can learn how to  contract a  cross staff  so added them here for record

brilliant old book on renaisssance scientiifc instruments  just look at that tychos tranverse scale http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu//full/1986JBAA...96..353C/0000354.000.html

a build your own cross staff from instructions  http://www-spof.gsfc.nasa.gov/stargaze/Scrostaf.htm like this the best
using a cross staff to measure angular separation http://www.education.com/science-fair/article/angular-separation/

in no way is it painless this loss of emotion

 read Death of empire by M K hulme  one of his trilogy books this is prohecy book 2   seen it all before  novel set in  the time of attila the hun   only   new idea that merlin was a travelling healer with the roman army    journeying with a crowd of other woadish  stereotypes from Britannia  to constantinople  a little less conversation a little more action needed in this novel!  most of the  big events  were peripheral  and the main characters Aetius, Atilla just had walk on parts  starting well it had by page 200  turned into   a 1950s melodrama of a door stop sized  Roman empire novel without a good story   in contrast to  anything by  ben kane or richard blake
with  all MK Hulme the story is padded out for  duration of the full series  and that is the weak point of this well researched  dark age series

A line in the sand  - Britain France and the struggle that shaped the modern middle East by james barr  based on Newly  declassified government papers  this is  a stuffy archive of a book that re tells the  period of the   revolt in the desert form cabinet minutes and  has less content on interwar Syria than i expected  and  then goes full speed  into the  oftold transformation  of Palestine into Israel  a more interesting book on the changes  and politics in  interwar iraq and transjordan is  reduced to a few paragraphs 




modern art british art in the early 20th century basee on the whitechapel art gallery catalogue  of 1914 and it five strands of modern art   it followed this lead to   write about sickets tabloid mrder paintings,  vortiicism tyros pastel vanessa bell    and had a good section on  blomberg  and gettlers jewsih art  lie the 1914 catalogue it only shows how art and taste are dated 

the city of london   a companion guide by nicholas kenyon    this is not the london of legends or tourist attractions  but the city area from temple to tower    concentrating on the architecture of  demolished churches,  livery halls and  the changing  sites of financial institutions from  flat Georgian edifice  to  1960s tower then  this demolished for 21st century  skyscraper

did not write much  poetry   applied for nine voluntary jobs and three college courses to move on

humanity the ape of anxiety

got letter warning me of "potential redundancy  that reflects the  difficult trading  circumstances  in which we are operating"
10 years as  twice national award winning adult education tutor specialising in  adaptive technology
well that is it having bouts of anxiety   for past week but that of worry over travel to college at night to do  further education  teaching course  and wait for bus in an another town  dark  now not so anxious as realised can afford taxi there and back  but of course now no place to teach at - neither have i taken the  29 days of holiday owing to me

poetry still popular with readers for example  he died in the ark http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=29549

Not sure where you were led with it, but a bloody brilliant piece of poetry."
"I'm not completely sure I follow the exact meanings of it, but at the same time, I found it a sparking and stirring piece of poetry."

writing lot of mystic variations on myth and tending to tell  little stories in my poetry ie he died in the ark  timeslip, threshold bride , the sleeping engine,  zennor morning,  arthur the king,  helen is finally faceless 
that tell as much as the long romantic narratives
will still carry on with this

I have hoped to build my hawaiian  star compass if it EVER stops raining  and construct a cross staff  and build a paper sextant from kit  and hoped to blog on it
using the astrolabe  i can only work out I am standing still  !

those crazy eccentric British is all an act!

read whitstaple mum in custard shortage  and other world exclusives  from Britain's finest local newspapers  an attempt to be funny with headlines like  cat stuck on roof, two dogs collide on pavement -dog hurts nose, church window nearly smashed    snow on roof for third day an update  however the news papers were local to the authors area  rarely going up north and the Argus (brighton and Hove ) hogged these headlines (14articles  in total)   a slim volume it was padded out by having both the  newspaper headline and article in full from clipping  and  on the facing  page  a  duplicated word for word transcript of the article content

understanding italian renaissance art   another thames and hudson book  with  some fine painting based around themes  ie colour, devotion. atmosphere  and fashion

romantic moderns  english writers artists and the imagination from  virginia woolf to john piper  by Alexandra Harris  a study of inter war  writers   with  some famous now others famous then  showing their development form rural isolation and village inspired lyrics to writing sponsored rural travel guides and  painting for advertising commissions 

London by peter ackroyd

  a concise classic of a book  with  incredible detail on  london as lived  from saxon times to late victorian along the   themes of sewers, parish poor and  parish  watch   hanged, haunted   and fogged over   excellent guide  to London as it was   all gone now  wonderful to read about

 read well and some poetry notes but  had number of work meetings and despite great success in past   lack of  future funding  in my area of expertise   there is an irony there somewhere