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

Atman

World Religion
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

The innermost self or soul in Hindu philosophy, identical with Brahman in Advaita Vedanta, eternal and unchanging.

Detailed Definition
Atman is the true essence beyond body, mind, and ego—the silent witness within. The Upanishads declare “Tat Tvam Asi” (“That Thou Art”), equating Atman with universal Brahman. In poetry, Atman appears as the hidden light, the unshaken core, or the voice of conscience. Mystical verses describe its realization as the end of fear and separation. Poets contrast the fleeting world with the permanence of Atman, using metaphors like the lamp in a windless place or the sky within a pot. Its discovery is the goal of yoga, meditation, and self-inquiry in literary and spiritual traditions.
Example
Example in poetry:
The Chandogya Upanishad’s “Tat Tvam Asi” echoes in a modern poem: “The spark in me is the fire in all—Atman is Brahman”; A meditative verse: “If Atman is untouched by joy or grief, why do I tremble?”; In a death lyric: “Your body departs, but Atman returns to the ocean it never left”; A minimalist statement: “Atman: not a thing to find, but the finding itself.”

In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna tells Arjuna: “The Atma is never born, nor ever dies”—a line echoed in countless Indian poems; Tagore’s Gitanjali explores Atma as the inner spark of the divine: “Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure”; In Advaita poetry, Atma and Brahman are one: “Wave and ocean—names for the same salt”; Modern poets use Atma to navigate identity: “In the mirror, I seek not face but Atma—still, vast, unbound.”
Additional Notes
Atman, the innermost self, is central to Upanishadic inquiry (“Tat Tvam Asi”—Thou art That). In Advaita Vedanta, atman = Brahman: the individual soul is non-different from ultimate reality. Other schools (e.g., Dvaita) see atman as eternally distinct. This concept fuels much of Hindu devotional and philosophical poetry, from Shankara’s nondual verses to Kabir’s critiques of ritual without self-knowledge. For literary analysis, atman provides a metaphysical anchor—characters seeking truth often pursue self-realization, not external salvation.

Atma (or Atman) in Hindu philosophy is the eternal self, identical with Brahman (ultimate reality) in Advaita Vedanta; unlike the Western “soul,” atma is not individual but universal; poets like Tagore or the Upanishadic seers use atma to dissolve boundaries between self and cosmos, inspiring verse that merges introspection with cosmic unity.
Also Known As
Self Soul Inner Essence Atma Spirit Self (in Hindu philosophy)
Skip to main content