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 D

Duck

Birds
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 common waterfowl known for its webbed feet, quacking call, and aquatic habits.

Detailed Definition
Ducks appear in poetry as symbols of domesticity, adaptability, and the rhythms of everyday nature. Their presence on ponds or city lakes bridges wild and urban spaces, often evoking nostalgia or tranquility. In fables and children’s verse, they represent simplicity and familial bonds. More subtly, ducks can signify hidden depths beneath placid surfaces, or the gentle persistence of life in both pastoral and modern settings.
Example
Example in poetry:
In children’s poetry, the duck’s waddle and quack provide playful rhythm and onomatopoeic charm, as in “Five Little Ducks”; In pastoral verse, ducks gliding on village ponds symbolize tranquility and the harmony of domesticated nature; Modern urban poets depict mallards nesting in city parks, highlighting nature’s adaptability to concrete landscapes; In fables turned poetic, the duck represents simplicity and maternal devotion (e.g., “The Ugly Duckling” retellings); Ecopoets use diving ducks like scaup to draw attention to wetland pollution and the hidden life beneath placid surfaces; The duck’s V-formation flight (though more typical of geese) is sometimes poetically borrowed to evoke unity and seasonal passage.
Additional Notes
Duck: Ducks appear widely in poetry as symbols of domesticity, adaptability, or comic relief, but wild ducks (like mallards or teals) can evoke migration, seasonal change, or wetland beauty. Their synchronized movements and varied plumage offer rich visual imagery. Avoid overused phrases (“like water off a duck’s back”) by focusing on specific species or behaviors.
Also Known As
Waterfowl Duckling (juvenile) Drake (male) Hen (female) Jouk
Skip to main content