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



Erech

Historical Location
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 ancient Sumerian city, also known as Uruk, associated with Gilgamesh

Detailed Definition
Erech (Uruk) was one of the earliest urban centers in Mesopotamia and the legendary city of King Gilgamesh. In Genesis 10:10, it is listed among Nimrod’s cities. Poets reference Erech to evoke the dawn of civilization, epic heroism, and the search for immortality—drawing on the Epic of Gilgamesh to explore human limits and the quest for meaning.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Genesis 10, Erech (Uruk) is listed among the first cities, evoking early urban poetry; In the Epic of Gilgamesh (ancient poetic text), Erech is Gilgamesh’s majestic capital; Modern Iraqi poets reclaim Erech as a cradle of literary civilization; In archaeological verse, Erech symbolizes the birth of writing and epic; Contemporary poets use Erech to reflect on humanity’s enduring quest for meaning.
Additional Notes
Erech (Uruk) was a major Sumerian city, home of Gilgamesh in the world’s oldest epic. In Genesis 10, it’s listed among Nimrod’s cities. In poetry, Erech symbolizes the dawn of urban life, heroic quest, and literary origins. Modern Iraqi poets reclaim it as cultural cradle. Students should connect it to the Epic of Gilgamesh and its walls as metaphors for human achievement and mortality.
Also Known As
Uruk City of Gilgamesh Wall’d Erech Sumerian Metropolis
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