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 C

cheetah

Fauna
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

A cheetah is a slender, long-legged feline with a spotted coat and tear-streaked face, famed as the fastest land animal, symbolizing speed, elegance, and single-minded pursuit.

Detailed Definition
The cheetah's non-retractable claws and lean build make it a creature of straight-line purpose, often used in poetry to represent ambition, the chase, and the fleeting nature of opportunity. Its tear marks, which reduce sun glare, give it a perpetually mournful expression, adding a layer of tragic beauty to its sprint. Poets invoke the cheetah to convey the exhilaration and exhaustion of high-speed existence, the beauty of pure function, and the vulnerability of a specialist that gambles everything on a single, explosive burst of energy.
Example
Example in poetry:
Abu Nuwās wrote a poem dissecting the cheetah's physique and stalking technique.; A poet might write, "At night I often find a cheetah running hard to the left and to the right".; The cheetah's speed can symbolize ambition, as in "Cheetah, Cheetah Faster then a Hyena".; Its tear-streaked face adds a layer of tragic beauty.; The animal's vulnerability to extinction is a modern theme.
Additional Notes
The cheetah's extraordinary speed makes it a natural symbol for ambition, urgency, and the fleeting, single-minded pursuit of a goal. Its tear-streaked face, which reduces sun glare, gives it a perpetually mournful expression that poets have used to evoke tragic beauty or the cost of relentless effort. In classical Persian poetry, the cheetah appears as a hunting companion, representing aristocratic prowess and the thrill of the chase. The cheetah's vulnerability—its low genetic diversity and endangered status—adds a layer of pathos to its symbolic power. When writing, consider whether you wish to emphasize the exhilaration of speed, the loneliness of the specialist, or the vulnerability of a species pushed to the brink.
Also Known As
spotted sprinter fastest feline tear-marked
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