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 F

ferlie

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

A variant spelling of "ferly," meaning a wonder, marvel, or strange occurrence; used in Scottish and Northern English dialect poetry.

Detailed Definition
"Ferlie" is a variant form of "ferly," maintaining the same meaning of wonder, marvel, or strange thing, particularly common in Scottish poetry and ballads. Burns and other Scottish poets employed it when describing supernatural or wonderful events, maintaining dialectal authenticity while accessing medieval romance vocabulary. The term's survival in Scots gave it particular cultural associations with Scottish literary tradition. Poets valued such dialectal variants for creating regional character and connecting to folk traditions where marvelous tales remained vital. "Ferlie" appears in contexts of amazement and supernatural encounter, where ordinary vocabulary seemed inadequate for extraordinary phenomena. Its use signaled connection to older literary traditions and regional speech communities. The variant spelling itself functioned as a marker of dialectal and historical authenticity, allowing poets to claim cultural and temporal specificity while exploring universal themes of wonder, mystery, and the marvelous in narrative verse.
Example
Example in poetry:
The peasants witnessed a strange ferlie in the sky; "What ferlie is this that appears before us?"; Ferlie denotes a wonder or marvel; Ancient poems record ferlies and prodigies; Comets and eclipses were considered ferlies; The ferlie frightened the superstitious villagers
Additional Notes
Ferlie represents Scottish and Northern English dialectal variation of "ferly," appearing in regional poetry and literature emphasizing local color. Border ballads and Scottish poetry employ it for supernatural occurrences or natural wonders. The spelling variation marks regional identity and authentic voice. Related to "ferly" (standard spelling) and conceptually to "marvel" and "prodigy." Essential for analyzing dialectal literature, Scottish poetry's distinct character, and how regional spelling signals authentic local voice versus standardized English. Burns and other Scottish poets use such terms to establish national identity. Useful for discussing linguistic nationalism, the political dimensions of dialect in poetry, and how spelling choices signal regional authenticity and resistance to English linguistic hegemony.
Also Known As
wonder marvel astonishment surprise
Skip to main content