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 E

et in Arcadia ego

Latin Phrases
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

And in Arcadia I (am); memento mori appearing in pastoral settings, reminding that death exists even in paradise.

Detailed Definition
Et in Arcadia ego, "And in Arcadia I," famously inscribed on tombs in pastoral paintings, means "Even in Arcadia, I [death] am present." In poetry, this phrase introduces mortality into idealized landscapes, puncturing pastoral fantasy with death's reality. Poets invoke it when acknowledging that no retreat escapes mortality, that death haunts even paradise. The phrase suggests both warning and melancholy wisdom, the acceptance that beauty and death coexist. It appears in elegiac pastoral, sophisticated versions of the genre that refuse simple escapism, where speakers recognize that Arcadia is haunted, that the tomb stands in the garden, that even imagined perfection cannot exclude what it exists to forget.
Example
Example in poetry:
A pastoral elegy invokes "et in Arcadia ego—even in paradise, death is present"; Poussin's paintings made "et in Arcadia ego" famous, death speaking from tomb; Contemporary verse uses it when puncturing idealism: "Et in Arcadia ego: even here, mortality intrudes"; A poem about paradise employs the phrase: "Et in Arcadia ego reminds us the serpent was in Eden"; Verse about mortality uses "et in Arcadia ego" to insist death haunts every refuge; Poets writing sophisticated pastoral invoke "et in Arcadia ego" to acknowledge death cannot be escaped
Additional Notes
Et in Arcadia ego famously inscribed on tombs in Poussin paintings, means "Even in Arcadia I"—with I referring to death speaking. The phrase introduces mortality into idealized pastoral landscapes, puncturing fantasy with death's reality. Poets invoke et in Arcadia ego when practicing sophisticated pastoral that refuses simple escapism, when acknowledging that no retreat escapes mortality. Related to memento mori tradition, to vanitas themes, and to darker pastoral that recognizes death haunts even paradise. Useful for understanding elegiac pastoral, poems that combine beauty with mortality, works that refuse to segregate death from life. The phrase suggests that Arcadia—imagined paradise—is always already haunted, that the tomb stands in the garden, that Eden contains the serpent. Contemporary poets use et in Arcadia ego when resisting pastoral's utopian impulse, when insisting that even ideal spaces contain death, suffering, loss.
Also Known As
even in Arcadia I too in Arcadia
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