A quiet notice V2Melody closes at midnight on , Spanish time.

Closes

A note from Richard

V2Melody will close at midnight on 20 January 2028

This site has been a retirement project in musical poetry: poems chosen with care and set to music, offered freely for as long as it felt right to keep the garden open.

The work no longer holds the place it once did in my life. I have gone as far with it as I wish to go. Like a sand mandala, it was made to be completed and then released. I am not attached to its permanence, and I do not believe any of it needs to last beyond the time it was given. The poems were already here before I arrived and began to experiment with them. They will still be here when these musical experiments, and indeed myself, have been swept away, like the sand of a mandala. Nothing has been lost.

I want a simpler end to my life, days of simple love and enjoyment with my wonderful wife of 20 years. The work of maintaining a server, the monitoring, and the residual obligations that come with keeping a site alive no longer fit that life.

From 4 November 2026 I will not be adding new poems or musical poems to the site.

The experimental music I am making now is on my Suno profile. Those pieces stay there, and are not added to this site.

Until midnight on 20 January 2028, Spanish time, everything remains available exactly as it is. That is when my VPS server contract comes to an end, and it will not be renewed. After that, the server will be switched off and the site will disappear.

The Mandala Is Finished explains this more fully.

Thank you to anyone who found a poem, a track, or a quiet moment here.

The pleasure was in the making.

Richard

Home › Glossary › Letter A

alas

Archaic Terms
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

An archaic exclamation expressing profound sorrow, grief, or regret; in verse, it functions as a poignant interjection that heightens emotional intensity and signals tragic realization.

Detailed Definition
Alas conveys lamentation across centuries of English poetry from Chaucer onward. Its emotional directness suits elegies, tragedies, and reflective lyrics. Poets use it to universalize personal pain, creating empathetic resonance while maintaining formal elegance in expressions of loss and longing.
Example
Example in poetry:
Alas, the rose has withered ere the summer's end.; Alas for the lost days of youth and golden light!; "Alas," she cried, "my heart is broken beyond repair."; Alas, the hero falls where once he stood triumphant.; Poets lament, alas, the fleeting nature of mortal joy.; Alas, the ship has sunk beneath the stormy waves.
Additional Notes
Notes on alas: As an interjection of lament, "alas" has been a staple in English poetry from Chaucer through Shakespeare to the Romantics, often signaling emotional peaks in elegies or tragic monologues. It carries a musical quality that fits iambic patterns and universalizes personal grief, making abstract sorrow relatable. For poetry students, practice inserting it to heighten pathos without modern slang. Professors may discuss its evolution from genuine sorrow to occasional ironic use in contemporary pastiche. Related to other exclamations like "woe" or "alack," it builds emotional intensity when repeated or paired with vivid imagery of loss, helping learners understand how archaic interjections compress complex feelings into concise, powerful expressions suitable for performance or recitation.
Also Known As
alack woe alackaday More's the pity Wirrasthrue Ochone hech Hélas
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