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

durst

Archaic Terms
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 archaic past tense of "dare," used with "thou" as in "Thou durst not question me," meaning "You dared not question me," suggesting challenged courage.

Detailed Definition
“Durst” expressed past-tense daring or defiance, common in Shakespearean and biblical English (“How durst you?”). It appears in poetry to convey courage, insolence, or moral challenge. Its archaic form adds gravity to confrontations or internal struggles. Though replaced by “dared,” “durst” retains rhetorical power in verse, marking moments of risk, rebellion, or ethical testing.
Example
Example in poetry:
Who durst approach the dragon's lair? (dared, past tense); No man durst speak against the tyrant's word (dared to); I durst not look upon her face (did not dare); None durst oppose him when his anger rose (dared to); How durst thou question my authority? (how dare you); They durst not venture into those dark woods (did not dare)
Additional Notes
Durst is the past tense of "dare" specifically used with "thou": "thou durst not speak." However, it also appears as a past tense in formal registers without thou: "he durst not move." The modern past tense "dared" supplanted durst. In Shakespeare and the King James Bible, durst carries connotations of fear, courage, or boldness: "Who durst do more is none" (Macbeth). The auxiliary use (durst + infinitive without "to") is characteristic: "I durst not tell thee." Students should recognize that durst often appears in contexts of challenge, prohibition, or feared consequences. In poetry, durst's harsh consonant cluster reinforces its semantic field of danger and daring. Compare "dust" (archaic past of dare, less common than durst).
Also Known As
darest dared
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