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.

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 D

Dog Days

Seasons
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 hottest, most oppressive period of summer. The phrase can convey languor, discomfort, and suspended activity.

Detailed Definition
Dog days traditionally refers to the sultry period of high summer associated with the rising of Sirius, the Dog Star. Poets use it for heat-hazed streets, drowsing animals, dry gardens, and slowed human ambition. Its atmosphere can be sensual and luxuriant, but also irritable or exhausted, as ordinary routines seem to stall beneath relentless sun. In a poem, dog days may heighten desire, boredom, fever, or the feeling that time has thickened into a long, shimmering afternoon.
Example
Example in poetry:
"The dog days pressed their hot paw on the silent town" personifies the oppressive heat of late summer; A poet can use dog days to slow a poem's pace with still air and buzzing insects; "During the dog days, even the river forgot how to speak" suggests drought and exhaustion; Dog days imagery can contrast blazing afternoons with the faint promise of autumn
Additional Notes
Dog days describes summer heat that slows work and thought. The phrase comes from the rising of Sirius, the Dog Star, and can suggest languor, irritability, or stagnation.
Other Meanings of “Dog Days”
Also Known As
Dog Days of Summer Canicular Days
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