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.

I want a simpler life, without the hassle of being online. The work of maintaining a server, the monitoring, and the residual obligations that come with keeping a site alive no longer fit the life I want.

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.

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 L

Lyric caesura

Prosody
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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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 pause or break placed within a line of lyric verse to enhance musicality and emotional effect

Detailed Definition
A lyric caesura marks a deliberate interruption in the flow of lyric poetry, often corresponding to breath, emotional shifts, or tonal changes rather than strict metrical divisions. In lyric verse, which prioritizes musical quality and emotional expression, the lyric caesura serves to modulate rhythm, create emphasis, and guide the reader through nuanced emotional territories, making it essential to understanding how lyrics achieve their distinctive conversational intimacy.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Latin elegiac couplets, the lyric caesura often occurs after the first syllable of the third foot in the pentameter line, as in Ovid’s “Amores”: “In nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas”; In Horace’s Odes, lyric caesurae divide lines into balanced cola for musicality; In English adaptations of Horatian odes, such as by Andrew Marvell (“Horatian Ode upon Cromwell’s Return from Ireland”), caesurae after the second or third syllable create lyrical phrasing; In Sappho’s fragments, lyric caesurae segment stanzas into melodic phrases; In Ben Jonson’s lyrics, such as “Drink to me only with thine eyes,” caesurae enhance song-like rhythm; In Catullus’s lyric poems, caesurae often fall mid-foot to match lyre accompaniment.
Additional Notes
Lyric caesura denotes a pause within a metrical line that aligns with natural speech phrasing in lyrical poetry, often occurring near the middle of the line (e.g., after the fourth syllable in iambic pentameter). Unlike dramatic or epic caesurae, the lyric caesura tends to be softer and more musical, supporting the introspective or emotive tone of lyric verse. It enhances breath control and emotional pacing, and its placement can subtly shift emphasis. Compare with masculine and feminine caesurae, which refer to pause placement relative to stressed/unstressed syllables.
Also Known As
medial caesura melodic caesura
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