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

fico

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

An expression of contempt, often accompanied by an insulting gesture; also spelled "fig," used to show disdain or dismissal.

Detailed Definition
"Fico" derives from Italian "fica," referring to both the fig fruit and a vulgar gesture of contempt made by thrusting the thumb between fingers. In Renaissance England, "a fig for" or "a fico for" expressed extreme dismissal or scorn, often accompanying the offensive gesture. The term appears in Shakespeare and contemporary literature as a compact expression of defiance or derision. Poets and dramatists valued such culturally specific insults for their theatricality and economy—a single word conveyed complex social meaning. The fig's symbolic associations—with fertility, sexuality, and worthlessness—enriched its metaphoric potential. Characters using "fico" demonstrated knowledge of Continental manners and the international language of insult, making the term useful for worldly or pretentious speakers in verse and drama.
Example
Example in poetry:
A fico for your threats, I fear you not!; "I care not a fico for his opinion"; Fico was a vulgar gesture of contempt; Shakespeare's Pistol cries fico at his enemies; The insulted man gave a fico in response; To give a fico showed complete disdain
Additional Notes
Fico appears primarily in Renaissance drama as contemptuous gesture and exclamation, most famously in Shakespeare's "Henry V" where Pistol makes the insulting gesture. The term derives from Italian/Spanish fig-showing gesture (thumb between fingers, sexually insulting). Related to "fig" (both fruit and insult). Essential for analyzing gestural communication in drama, Italian influence on English culture, and embodied insults. The term combines verbal and physical components, showing drama's representation of bodily communication. Useful for discussing how texts represent gesture, cross-cultural insult traditions, and the physicality of contempt. Its Mediterranean origin reflects early modern cultural contact. The gesture's sexual implications add force to its contemptuous function, linking body, sexuality, and insult.
Also Known As
trifle fig worthless thing
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