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

crack

Dialect
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

In Scots Dialect, “crack” means to talk, chat, or share friendly conversation.

Detailed Definition
“Crack” is a Scots word used as both a verb and a noun for lively, informal talk or companionship. In poetry, it can evoke a close rural community, suggesting people gathering to exchange news, stories, and jokes. It does not mean to break something or make a sharp sound in this Dialectal use.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Violet Jacob’s “Hallowe’en,” the speaker describes farm workers after dark: “Ye’ll see the horsemen stand an’ crack” Here, “stand an’ crack” means “stand and chat.” The phrase creates an image of horsemen lingering beside the stacks of harvested grain, sharing conversation during the Halloween season. This ordinary social scene also makes the speaker’s memory of the absent Lachlan more poignant.
Additional Notes
“Crack” is a common Scots and northern English Dialect term, often also spelled “crack” in standard writing. As a noun, “a good crack” can mean enjoyable conversation, company, news, or entertainment; this sense is especially familiar in Irish and northern British usage as “the craic.” Do not confuse this meaning with standard English “crack,” meaning a split, a sharp noise, or an attempt (“have a crack at”). Related Scots Dialect words in Jacob’s poem include “whaur” (“where”), “ilka” (“each”), and “bothie” (“small cottage or hut”).
Also Known As
Conversation Chat Talk Fireside Gossip
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