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

cloak

Apparel
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 outer covering that hangs from the shoulders and fastens at the neck, providing warmth and concealment, often symbolizing mystery, protection, or disguise in verse.

Detailed Definition
The cloak is arguably the most dramatically charged outer garment in the poetic tradition, appearing in ballads, romances, and gothic poetry as a vehicle for transformation, secrecy, and sudden revelation. Its voluminous folds can hide a dagger, a letter, or a lover's face, making it indispensable for narratives of intrigue and elopement. In medieval chivalric poetry, the cloak is often bestowed as a mark of favor or stolen as a token of shame. The act of wrapping a cloak around another person signals a profound gesture of shelter or alliance. Moreover, the cloak's ability to be "cast aside" provides a ready image for throwing off sorrow, constraint, or old identity, while its heavy weight in rain or snow underscores the physical endurance of travelers and outcasts in landscape poetry.
Example
Example in poetry:
"Prefer my cloak unto the cloak of dust 'neath which the last year lies" (Ezra Pound, "The Cloak"); "The cloak Life made for her was gray in hue and shaped to hide her lissomness of line" (Anna Louise Barney); "Thou kens my cloak is very thin: It is so bare and over worn" ("The Old Cloak"); "My cloak it was a very good cloak, it hath been always true to the wear"; "I wonder which cloak you'll be wearing when you dance through my dreams tonight"; "I wear a cloak of laughter, how frail you are and thin!"
Additional Notes
The cloak is arguably the most dramatically charged outer garment in the poetic tradition, appearing in ballads, romances, and gothic poetry as a vehicle for transformation, secrecy, and sudden revelation. Its voluminous folds can hide a dagger, a letter, or a lover's face, making it indispensable for narratives of intrigue and elopement. In medieval chivalric poetry, the cloak is often bestowed as a mark of favor or stolen as a token of shame. The act of wrapping a cloak around another person signals a profound gesture of shelter or alliance. Moreover, the cloak's ability to be "cast aside" provides a ready image for throwing off sorrow, constraint, or old identity, while its heavy weight in rain or snow underscores the physical endurance of travelers and outcasts. Related terms include mantle, robe, cape, and pelisse. Students should note that the cloak often functions as an extension of the wearer's will, capable of both concealment and revelation, making it a natural vehicle for poems about identity and transformation.
Also Known As
mantle cape outer wrap shawe shrowd
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