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 O

Omdurman

Battles
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 1898 British-Egyptian victory over Sudanese Mahdists, showcasing modern firepower’s dominance.

Detailed Definition
Omdurman epitomized colonial asymmetry and technological imperialism. In poetry, it symbolizes the tragic clash between tradition and modernity—appearing in British and postcolonial verse as a moment where rifles mowed down spears, evoking themes of hubris, cultural erasure, and the moral ambiguity of “civilizing” conquest.
Example
Example in poetry:
Omdurman, site of Kitchener’s 1898 victory, appears in British imperial verse as technological triumph over “savagery”; A modern elegy might contrast Omdurman’s Mahdist martyrs with colonial narratives; In a dramatic monologue, a Sudanese warrior recalls charging Maxim guns at Omdurman; A sonnet could frame Omdurman as the twilight of cavalry in the age of machine fire; Contemporary poets use Omdurman to critique empire’s dehumanizing language; A haiku might capture dust devils swirling over Omdurman’s silent battlefield.
Additional Notes
Omdurman (1898) starkly illustrated the asymmetry of colonial warfare, where Maxim guns decimated Mahdist forces; in British imperial poetry, it symbolized technological supremacy and civilizational arrogance, while postcolonial verse reclaims it as a site of resistance and tragic heroism against mechanized slaughter.
Also Known As
Battle of Omdurman Khartoum Campaign
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