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 F

Forty-Two Judges

Mythology
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

Assessor deities who witness the deceased’s confession of innocence in the Hall of Two Truths

Detailed Definition
The Forty-Two Judges, each representing a nome and a sin, hear the “Negative Confession” before the Weighing of the Heart. They ensure moral accountability. In poetry, they symbolize conscience, universal ethics, and the inescapable scrutiny of one’s deeds—frequently used in introspective or judgmental verse on morality.
Example
Example in poetry:
Forty-Two Judges, assessors of the dead in the Hall of Two Truths; Poets describe the Forty-Two Judges as gods of Egypt’s nomes; Each judge hears confessions: “I have not stolen, lied, or killed”; The deceased must know each name to pass safely; In spells, the soul addresses them with humility and truth; Verse uses the Judges to explore conscience and accountability.
Additional Notes
The Forty-Two Judges are the assessors in the Hall of Two Truths who hear the deceased’s declaration of innocence (the “Negative Confession”)—they represent localized moral laws and divine scrutiny, useful in poetry for exploring conscience, communal ethics, or the fragmentation of judgment.
Also Known As
Assessors of Ma’at Tribunal of the Dead
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